The Good Left Undone
by Absolutely Unsure
Summary: What if when Itachi and Kisame came to get Naruto he hadn’t given any resistant? What if he wanted to become a member of the Akatsuki? After five years of training, things are finally starting to heat up for Naruto, as well as for everyone else... DARKFIC
1. Give It All

A/N: This story has been inspired by my recent infatuation for the Akatsuki. Also, this story is RATED FOR GRAPHIC VIOLENCE AND EXCESSIVE USE OF THE F WORD (along with others). IF YOU DON'T LIKE THAT, DON'T READ.

* * *

Standard Disclaimers for Entire Story:

_Naruto (and all other respective, phantasmagorical characters) don't belong to me. I only use the bubbling blond to turn him into a kick-ass killer because Kishimoto wouldn't do it for me._

_I also don't own any of the artists/bands whose song titles and lyrics I will be using. (Note I may tweak or switch around the words a little)_

* * *

**Chapter 1 : Give It All**

_Break through the undertow, your hand I can't seem to find.  
It's time to come to our senses , up from the dirt.  
Today I offer myself to this.  
I'm living for my dying wish.  
I give it all, now there's a reason...there's a reason to give it all...  
To give it all..._

* * *

"Where the FUCK did pervy sage go?!" Naruto sourly swore to himself, using a curse he usually never does, as he sat on the window seal and starred out into the bustling city that was fully alive with a festival. He was feeling oddly unhappy today with the toad sage blowing him off for the black haired bimbo.

He leaned against the window frame lazily as he subconsciously looked at the people walking past. His eyes focused on a small family of a mother, father, and a ten year old son. The boy tripped on a stray rock in the road suddenly and fell, only to be cuddled by his mother two seconds later as he cried his heart out, his father patting his head to try and further comfort him and stop his wails.

For some reason, this usually heartfelt picture…made Naruto utterly sick to his stomach. Who was there for _HIM_ when he'd fallen down so many times, abused so many times, _FAILED_ so many times? Until Iruka, when he'd started acknowledging Naruto when he was nine, there was NO ONE. All those years of isolation…and for some reason, all that pain and hurt was finally starting to crack that mask of the happy dope that he'd worked so hard to put on.

Ripping his eyes from the picture perfect family scene, he jumped back into the room, his stomach continuing to flip as if he wanted to puke. Was there anyone, ANYONE, else who had really cared for him? Sure, Iruka…and there was the third…but he was dead. He held no more value rather then a few memories. Then there was Jiraiya, his new 'sensei.' All he gives a damn about are boobs and ass, not about my development. He'd probably be happier if I LEFT. Naruto continued to think darkly to himself, his face now starting to contort in anger.

Lastly, what about the rest of his 'Team 7'? Naruto almost scoffed at the idea of them actually caring at all for him. All Kakashi cared about was Sasuke and his precious orange books. Sakura beat him to a pulp everyday even though he was continually nice to her. And Sasuke, sure, he could understand that he was hurt from losing all that he had, but that didn't mean he had to be an intensely emo B.U.B. every second of his life. Naruto had gone through worse…yet he still wore the mask of happiness…

His eyes suddenly started to tingle as tears began to form. What was his _purpose_ in life? Was there anyone he _really_ wanted to protect? He didn't have a family…no one was his friend…

"**Kukukuku…finally realizing the truth, I see?"** A deep rumbling voice said from some unknown place, making Naruto jump up from the bed, his unshed tears disappearing back into his eyes.

"Who are you?" Naruto asked aloud, grabbing a kunai from his pouch on the bed and trying to control his slight shaking.

"**Oh, you won't need that against me, unless you want to stab _yourself_****, that is."** The feral voice continued to say before breaking into another dark peal of laughter, Naruto noticing that the voice was coming from inside of him, inside his _head_.

"Wait…fox?" Naruto asked timidly as he dropped his kunai, the metal making a few clinks against the wood before finally settling.

"**Finally, I see that maybe you DO have a brain among all that hair. And I prefer to be called KYUUBI by the way."** The meticulous voice said nonchalantly as if they were talking about the weather.

"How…when…" Naruto struggled to say as he sat down on the bed, his mental stress now affecting his physical being.

"**I've always been here, Kit. Hearing and seeing whatever you do behind these bars. But only now, because of your sudden feelings of hate and despair, was I able to sneak even more into your brain so that now I can talk to you. Whenever I want, I may add."** The powerful nine-tails explained as Naruto starred at the white wall of the room, unable to say anything back.

"**So, you've just noticed that your life is royally fucked up…what are you going to do about it?"** Kyuubi asked, a growl hidden underneath the words.

"I…I don't know…" Naruto choked as he felt the stinging sensation start in his eyes again.

"**Don't start this shit again, SUCK IT UP!"** Kyuubi snapped, making Naruto rapidly blink his eyes to rid himself of the pain-filled droplets, once again retreating into his eyes.

"But-"

"**NO! You should be thankful of the position you're in. With my raw chakra power, you can accomplish so much, more then anyone else in history. More then anyone's even DREAMED about. Yet you choose to dwell on what OTHERS think of you. _Fuck them_****. Think of what YOU want for one goddamn second."**

"I…I…" Naruto struggled to say. A day ago, he would have said, in a heartbeat, that he'd wanted acceptance, love. Yet, now as he looked back and tried to imagine the future, he found himself only feeling hopelessness and forlornness. What was the point of becoming Hokage if they didn't even accept him…? As much as he regretted to throw away his dream for so long…he finally realized that the village hidden in the leaves would never fully accept him. What was the point in trying to protect and better people who outright rejected you?

"I want to make _myself_ better." He stated vaguely as he stood up, looking down at his juvenile, un-scarred hands.

"**How do you want to be better?"** The Kyuubi asked, his voice seeming to be like one out of Naruto's nightmares.

"I want…power." He continued to exclaim vaguely as his hands clenched into fists, so tight that his nails starting digging into his skin and his knuckles turned a bright white, a twisted grin now on the young nin's face.

"**Now…how are you going to do that…?"** The Kyuubi asked with a sense of what Naruto could only guess was amusement.

But before he could respond, a knocking was heard on the door, jumping Naruto out of his conversation with the Kyuubi.

"Coming…" Naruto grumbled in annoyance, wondering for a second if it was the pervy sage back from his 'date'.

But when he opened the doors, only to gaze up to see two gloomy figures at his doorstep, he suddenly felt a new emotion. One he'd never felt before.

"Who are you?" Naruto asked as he looked into the red sharingan eyes, suddenly not the least bit scared.

The red eyes blinked, silently wondering how this boy wasn't unconscious or paralyzed already from him starring directly into his eyes.

"**Naruto, I'm protecting us against his eyes, but you better hurry the hell up. It's exhausting my chakra because of his own power and can only do it five more minutes since I used a lot of chakra to already leak into your head." The Kyuubi said in his head, a hint of frustration laced in the words.**

/"Thanks Kyuubi."/ Naruto replied back in his head, eyes still attached to Itachi's.

"Well, doesn't he have some _spunk_. Can I cut his legs off?" Kisame asked as he reached behind for his ever-present sword, a sadistic grin on his face.

"No…" Itachi said slowly and quietly, eyes still locked with Naruto's.

"I'll ask again, who the fuck are you and what the fuck do you want?!" Naruto growled in their faces, not caring if he was about three feet shorter then them and no doubt less much powerful. But now with the Kyuubi more open and connected with him…he felt like NO ONE could touch him.

"We're the Akatsuki." Itachi said as he blinked his eyes, his sharingan disappearing as he'd used up too much of his energy spontaneously trying to take over Naruto.

"Yeah? And what the fuck does that mean?" Naruto said, suddenly finding that the word 'fuck' seemed like the best thing ever and had to be said in every sentence.

"Learn _respect_ bozu!" Kisame hissed as he snarled, his shark teeth gleaming as if trying to intimidate Naruto.

"Why don't YOU learn respect before I cut you up into sushi?" Naruto questioned back as he bared his own sharp teeth, his long canines grazing against his bottom lip.

"Come with us." Itachi said as he stretched an arm in front of Kisame so that he didn't jump Naruto. For some reason, Itachi felt that this boy was worth more then just the tailed beast sealed inside of him.

"Why should I?" Naruto asked nonchalantly as he looked down at his hands, which he noticed his fingernail piercing were already healed up.

"I'm guessing you want power." Itachi said with a straight face, although mentally he was smirking in triumph as he saw a glimmer in Naruto's cerulean eyes.

"Of coarse, everyone wants it." Naruto said as he crossed his arms and leaned against the door frame.

"Come, and we'll give it to you. That, or I kill you here and now." Itachi said; his sharingan activated again.

Naruto glanced down at his shinobi slippers, suddenly replaying back what he had thought not five minutes ago with the demon sealed inside of him.

"**Wasn't this what you were waiting for Kit?" **Kyuubi asked from inside his head, the giant fox smirking at this golden opportunity.

"What the hell. Sure." Naruto said as he walked in between the two taller males, closing the door behind him.

He lingered on letting go of the copper knob, feeling like if he closed this door he was shutting off his old life, and once he let go, there was no turning back. With a sneer, he retracted his hand as if he was touching hot metal. Why was he having second thoughts? There was no question in his mind now as he took a few steps away from the door to a new darker, sinister life.

"Don't you want anything from your room for the long trip?" Kisame asked, trying to act a _little_ civil since he'd gotten Itachi's approval.

Naruto choked out a bitter laugh as he turned around to face the two again, his face contorted in ungodly dark amusement, making him seem much older then twelve.

"Everything and everyone from before is gone and dead to me." Naruto snorted, concreting his thoughts into words for the other two rouge ninja.

Without another word, Itachi lead the way with Naruto behind him, Kisame taking up the rear.

When Jiraiya arrived not thirty seconds later, he desperately looked around for his new pupil, feeling the deepest despair when he couldn't find the young blond anywhere. As he entered the room, the unconscious girl lay unheeded on one of the beds, he grabbed the kunai from the ground, clenching it tightly in his hand as he could feel the faintm, unique chakra signature of Naruto.

"I'm sorry Yondaime…I've failed you." He whispered as he continued to stay crouched, not even reacting as he heard Sasuke demand in a shrill yell where Itachi was.

When Jiraiya would return to Kohana with Tsubame, news would quickly spread of Naruto's capture, and so his presumed death. No memory gravestone would be put up and no funeral would be held…his name wouldn't be written on the stone memorial for fallen heroes of Konohagakure…and except for a few select people, no one would miss him…

X - X - X

"Why have you called us all here Itachi?"

Currently, all the ten Akatsuki members were using astral projection, called by Itachi who had told them it was urgent. Naruto stood in between Itachi and Kisame, the only three whole bodies in the dark cave, far away from any village. Naruto had kept up a tough shell for the few days that they'd been traveling, not showing any emotion, but now, seeing all these powerful beings, his self-assurance was shot as his slightly shaking hands suggested.

"**Do not worry, Kit. They're not really here, and if either of the two who **_**are**_** here try and jump you, I've got it covered."** Kyuubi reassured, his dark voice sounding oddly father like, as if he was protecting Naruto as a son.

/"I can always count on you…thanks."/ Naruto commented back in his head. It'd taken a little for Naruto to get used to someone always being in his thoughts, but he soon learned that Kyuubi wasn't judgmental at all and, for the most part, agreed to whatever Naruto thought was best. Kyuubi had put it simply that he was the brawn and Naruto was the brains, no matter how small it is, the tailed beast had added with a growl of amusement. Kyuubi was actually much wiser, but had thought to himself that it would be better for Naruto to make his own decisions, especially since it was his own body on the line.

"I have found one of the tailed beast containers." Itachi said as he pushed Naruto forward, right into the middle where all the members could study him.

"He seems weak." Pein said with a shake of his head.

"Fuckin' pussy." Hidan added as he tilted his head to the right to examine Naruto, revealing his long line of grim stitches to connect his head that had been recently cut off.

"What is he, _ten_?" Deidara said with a chuckle, amused at his own half joke.

"Tobi likes him. Tobi thinks he's a good boy like Tobi." Tobi said, lightly bouncing in place as he said his opinion, his happy attitude making Naruto raise an eyebrow. Was this orange masked freak really a world-class criminal?

"So…what about this boy? What's the point?" Konan asked, her eyes sparkling as she examined Naruto, making the young nin feel an out of place surge of pride at an older woman eyeing him.

"He has potential. I can see it with my eyes. He's in equal, maybe even in more despair, to that of my brother. But he's just noticed this well of depression and anger, and more importantly, he can actually harness it to control the Kyuubi monster." Itachi explained in a placid face that was half hidden by his high collar.

"So what. We're just going to kill him." Kakuzu said, his own face hidden by his tight black mask.

"NO!" Naruto yelled, catching all the attention from the members.

"What did you say you little mother fucker?!" Hidan swore again, wishing he wasn't a hologram so that he could stab the boy and use him in one of his rituals, even if his blood was probably unworthy to his supreme god.

"I…" Naruto broke off, not knowing what to say for a second before continuing, "I would be more useful to you guys if I was alive." He said, balling his hand into fists.

"True, the Kyuubi has great power, but I can _wield_ it, and that's even _greater_ power. Take me as your apprentice, teach me, and you won't regret it. And if I'm not worthy…you can take my life and my demon." Naruto said strongly, meaning every word without a second of hesitation, the nine-tailed demon inside him laughing at his attempt to have a manly speech.

"This is such a fuckin jo-" Hidan began with a sadistic smirk, but was quickly interrupted and silenced by one simple word.

"Sure."

All other nine heads switched over to Pein who was nodding his head in understanding.

"Are you sure about this Pein?" Konan asked in a curious voice. She was indeed interested in this boy, she, along with everyone else she had no doubt, could tell that the boy had huge untapped reserves of chakra that, with a little practice, could be easily under his disposal.

"I've just been thinking about the future…what happens if some of us, in a very unlikely but not impossible chance, die? There haven't been any good recruitments lately. We need to get ready, when necessary, for the second generation of Akatsuki." Pein said, letting his eyes filter to Tobi for a second, breathing a hidden sigh of relief as he noticed he was bobbing his head up and down in agreement.

"But know this Itachi…" Pein broke off as he glared at the stone cold Uchiha, "if this ends horribly, it will be YOUR responsibility."

Itachi looked back emotionlessly before glancing down at Naruto who was looking up at him, a determined expression on his face.

"If he's considered, even the _slightest bit_, unfit Leader…" He said before closing his eyes, opening them to reveal his deadly sharingan yet again, "I will kill him myself."

Naruto suppressed a shiver and choose to glare back just as hard, letting a little of Kyuubi's chakra leak in, making his cerulean eyes turn a blazing orange and his body to lightly glow red.

"You won't regret it." Naruto announced as he smirked, his long canines shimmering in the seeming-less darkness.

And so began the training of Uzumaki Naruto to be one of the Akatsuki…

X - X - X _5 years later…_ X - X - X

"Wake up fox-boy!"

A seventeen year old Naruto groaned as he rolled over in his bed, opening his mouth for a brief second to growl at whoever it was who woke him up to go do something very rude, before covering his head with a pillow.

"I SAID, get up bozu!" Kisame exclaimed as he brought down his sword onto Naruto's bare arm that was above the sheets to hold the pillow on his head in place.

"FUCK!" Naruto hissed as he jumped out of bed, cradling his torn arm, the dripping blood starting to drastically stain the bed.

"Itachi's waiting." Kisame said with a smirk before leaving his room, closing the shoji door quietly as if nothing had happened.

"Fish-bait bastard." Naruto growled as he looked at his wounded arm for a second before focusing the slightest fraction of his chakra to his arm, the wound healing up in the blink of an eye, not even the slightest scratch left. He casually gave it a few licks, a habit he'd learned from Kyuubi, before getting up from his now bloody bed.

He groggily went into the small bathroom, splashing water onto his face before looking at himself in the mirror. These past five years had, literally, been a living hell for him. His first year he'd been with Itachi and Kisame, learning metal strength from the Uchiha and physical stamina and strength from the giant sword-wielder. He then went to Pein and Konan, followed by Deidara and Sasori, and then Hidan and Kakuzu (where he learned to bare a LOT of stabbing), staying one year with each partnership. In his final year, he went with Tobi for six months, and then Zetsu for the other part of the half-year. He'd finally just returned yesterday to Itachi and Kisame and Naruto, even though they hid it almost perfectly, could tell they were surprised at his development. Being with each pair allowed him to learn all their techniques, or the ones he COULD learn. During those crazy years, he'd learned so much, more then he'd ever hoped to imagine. One thing, though, he could have done without was the punishment. Because he was such an outcast, if he didn't get a jutsu the first time, he was severely beaten and, if not for the Kyuubi's great healing ability, he would have been dead a hundreds times over. He growled as he remembered how Hidan used any excuse, no matter how small, to make him feel severe physical pain.

But, in hindsight, he couldn't have asked for a better blessing as to joining this world domination obsessed group of outcast villains. He'd become so much stronger then he would have if he'd stayed in Konoha. He bitterly chuckled to himself as he finally realized and understood why Sasuke wanted power. It just felt…so damn good.

He snapped himself out of his reminiscent memories as he looked at his face in the mirror again. Truth be told, he hadn't seen his face in three years and it was weird to see himself now. His hair had nicely grown out, barely brushing against his shoulders near the base of his neck and bangs hanging in his eyes, partially hiding them. Yet most of the blond locks still stuck up in a nice, messy way, the added length not even a problem to it's spiky stability. His eyes were still its bright cerulean eyes, except how they used to glimmer with happiness, they now glimmered only in anger and dark amusement. He had a thin face with fairly defined cheekbones, his whisker marks slightly more defined as over the years he and Kyuubi blended more and more. His height, which he found intensely embarrassing when he'd started, had finally caught up to as he was just about six foot two, two thirds of it being his long, thin legs. Blinking, he finally realized that he was probably considered very…he struggled for a few seconds before finding the right word…_metrosexual_ by girls his age, the thought causing him to actually openly laugh, but made sure not to laugh _too_ loud as to wake Kyuubi who was still sleeping.

Finally, taking all he could from his older appearance, he threw on a black shirt and black pants accompanied by black shinobi sandals, very contrary to old his orange jumpsuit that seemed so naïve and childish now. He chuckled a few times again as he remembered how Itachi had burned it as soon as he'd jointed the organization.

Lastly, he took his forehead protector, the distinctive line through the leaf symbol that he'd done himself (with his own claw) after his first meeting also, and pocketed it so not to draw unwanted attention. He grabbed his straw hat and flipped it on his head, the small bell ringing softly before the sound drifted away, the paper strands covering his face.

He slide open the shoji doors again before walking down the hotel hallway and then proceeding down the stairs to the front doors where Itachi and Kisame were waiting.

"Took you long enough, bozu." Kisame snorted, eying his healed arm with a frown.

"I wonder when you'll stop calling me that. I AM pretty close to you." Naruto snapped back as he noticed he was only about a foot and a half shorter then him, but smirked inwardly at how the fish-man seemed disappointed that his wound was already healed. Kisame sneered before starting to walk after Itachi who had started walking a few second ago.

"So…where are we going?" Naruto questioned as he couldn't help but look around the town they were in, glaring at a young boy between the paper sheets who was looking at him oddly from afar, causing the youth to run away with scared eyes.

"We are having another meeting." Kisame answered, knowing Itachi wasn't going to talk unless it was absolutely necessary.

"For what?" Naruto asked nonchalantly, himself not liking to talk much anymore, but knew he should know everything that was happening.

"Why do you think?" Kisame as his lip curled back to reveal his triangular like teeth in what Naruto could only guess was a disparaging smile.

Naruto smirked right back, finding the answer was himself. They were having a meeting to talk about what to do next with him.

After about two hours of walking, Itachi finally lead them off the road where they started running at a beyond break neck speed, Naruto loving the feeling of the air running through his hair and clothes as he jumped from branch to branch on all fours, easily outrunning both Itachi and Kisame to one of their secret lairs that he'd smelled with his unnaturally acute nose.

In less then a minute after Naruto arrived at the cave, both Kisame and Itachi appeared, Naruto smart enough to wait for both of them to enter before him in a show of respect. Kisame intentionally shoved Naruto as he entered, causing Naruto to roll his eyes, knowing not to take his immature lure before following after, taking off his straw hat as the bell jingled again.

A few minutes more, and he was again in a cave full of all holograms with the exception of him, Itachi, and Kisame. Naruto held down a groan as this seemed eerily familiar as to his first meeting, his hand rubbing against the cool metal of his forehead protector in his pocket.

"I'm sure you're all aware that Naruto's five year plan has finally ended. We must decide what will happen to him next." Pein naturally started, as he was the leader; not wanting to waste more time then necessary.

"Kill him." Hidan said with a smirk thrown towards Naruto, who chose not to react and just stand there with his hands crossed behind his back and eyes closed, knowing that he had no say in this matter.

"As much as I hate admitting this, but we shouldn't throw him away…at least, not yet." Deidara said, Naruto cracking an eye open to stare at the blond headed nin, inwardly noting he needed to give him a gift…something to deal with art…

"I agree, he's too valuable now to destroy." Blue haired Konan added, giving a wink towards Naruto's way, making him lightly smirk. Not at her action, but at the way Pein suddenly tensed.

"Tobi thinks he's a good boy, just like I fist said, Naruto is a good boy like Tobi!" The orange masked ADHD member added, clapping his hands happily.

/"Tobi, you're such a dork…"/ Naruto thought as he inwardly blanched, making sure that no matter what anyone said he would keep a straight face.

"**I agree."** Kyuubi growled his consent groggily, obviously having just woken up.

/"I see you're finally up, _sunshine_."/ Naruto joked as he half-heartedly heard Sasori say his simple affirmation that Naruto should not be put away just yet.

"**Shut up and listen. This is important, it's about your future."**

/"I don't need them. I'm sticking around to just learn all their jutsus and then I'm gone."/ Naruto laughed back to Kyuubi although his face seemed placid on the outside.

"**Arrogant bastard."**

/"Damn right."/

"So it's agreed…that we won't kill Naruto as of right now. Now, onto more important issues dealing with other tailed beast containers." Pein said, his unique eyes scanning everyone in front of him.

Naruto couldn't help but let his hands twitch, surprised at this statement. He'd known that the Akatsuki were far beyond simple assassinations and espionage acts like they used to do, but what did they want with the other tailed beasts?

"As everyone knows, we're actually two years behind schedule. _Very bad_." Pein continued to explain, making Naruto start to feel his hands twitch more. How long had he not known about this?!

"We already have three of the nine, but we will be needing all of them to complete our goal."

"Leader-sama." Naruto objected, raising his hand as he made sure to stop the unwanted jerking.

"Yes, Naruto." Pein said, irked that he was interrupting him.

"Does that mean that I will be sacrificed as well?" He asked, careful to keep his voice even.

"Yes, that is one of the main reasons as to why we allowed you to stay in the first place, and now not to kill you just yet."

"I see, thank you." Naruto said as he starred down at his black shinobi slippers that were barely visible in the ominous darkness of the cave.

"**Kit, listen, this is important for reference."** Kyuubi snapped him out of his own musings, making him lift his blond head to start listening to the conversation again.

"Our next target will be the four-tailed beast in Iwagakure. Konan and I will take care of this, as it is the one that's assigned to us. Make sure to be on high alert in the next few days as you will be summoned for the sealing. That is all for today…" he drifted off as he noticed Naruto had raised his hand yet again.

"What is it Naruto?" Pein practically growled, wanting this to be over so he and Konan could start tracking and attacking the four-tailed demon.

"Is…is there any way to redeem myself and not be sacrificed?" Naruto asked with orange eyes, Kyuubi feeding into his determination.

"**Why do you want to do this Kit?"**

/"I don't want to be fucking sacrificed, do you want to be sealed away to use at their disposal?"/

"**Kukuku…ah, you are SO naïve about my power, just as all these dickheads are…but later, Pein is about to talk."**

"Something to join, and at your age...highly unlikely, practically impossible. And even if you're strong, you'd most likely be more useful in your Kyuubi being joined with the other tailed beasts…" Pein said in a thoughtful voice, half his face covered in his collar as he glanced down at the moist rock floor to think.

Naruto hung his head, starting to feel a sinking feeling until…

"But, there is one thing that you could do that would make you a member, or at the least, worthy to become one, like Tobi is right now. It'd make you considered more worthy of being sacrificed."

At hearing this, Naruto snapped his head open, his eyes now entirely alite with orange fire.

"You can kill Orochimaru, get back that ring that rightfully belongs to us. And when you get that ring…you may then rightfully wear it." Pein said, as the others stiffened in the room. Catching Orochimaru, who had been a betrayer to them, had been priority number one for many years, and yet now it was being handed over to a newbie?!

Yet no one chose to talk back, too scarred of Pein's power, as he was their rightful leader. And he didn't get there by being kind or lenient…

"I am honored with this duty." Naruto said as he bowed deeply, letting a smirk filter across his face as his head was down, before straightening again with a face of unequivocalness.

"You will be given a cloak, and your nail-polish shall be orange." Pein instructed, meaning the orders to be directed at Itachi and Kisame. Naruto would have laughed out loud (_loudly_) at the nail-polish color issue if he didn't know Pein was being completely serious…which he was.

"If there is no further questions, we may all leave. But know this, all of you. If you find any trace of Orochimaru, do not hesitate to investigate and kill him. And Naruto…" Pein broke off as his eyes focused on the lanky teen, "…if someone finds Orochimaru before you, your chance to join will be lost and you will, no doubt, be sacrificed."

Naruto nodded his head stiffly, a feeling of adrenaline already pumping through his blood at the chance to prove himself. Not to the members, he didn't give a shit what they thought of him, but to what he could prove to himself. He remembered bitterly how Orochimaru had made him into something close to a play-toy way back when in the Chunin Exams while in the forest of death. And Naruto held grudges. Yet they never lasted more then a few days as, all his past enemies had learned, he killed them quickly after confrontation. Yet Orochimaru had been a snake in yet another way, sneaking out of his head until now. But no more. This snake was about to get his head cut off…and Naruto was going to be the fuckin' one to do it if he had _any_ pride at all, which he actually knew he had in as much an amount as Kyuubi had chakra.

The members soon dispersed, leaving Naruto alone again with Kisame and Itachi, one of them still looking at where Pein had been while the other intensely glared at Naruto.

"I can't believe a little bozu-piece-of-_shit_ like you is getting this chance. All you've done is cling to everyone and suck off of their talent." Kisame said through his teeth that seemed more like razors to Naruto.

"You don't believe in me, strumpet shark?" Naruto asked in fake-hurt voice, Kyuubi howling with laughter from the inside as, he saw through Naruto's eyes, the blue skinned nin had no idea what Naruto had just insulted him as.

"We're wasting time." Itachi said quietly as he looked up to Naruto with his ever-present sharingan eyes. Naruto couldn't help but let his lip twitch into the slightest of a leer as he finally noticed he was taller then the psycho-killer. He had long ago been jaded from the pain and power of his kekkei-genkai, it now holding nothing even close to fear on him.

Without another word, Itachi walked to a separate part of the cave, opening it to reveal quite a few of the same, identical long black with red clouds coats. Naruto's eyes glimmered in amusement at the sight. When he'd began with Itachi and Kisame, he'd always looked at those jackets and childishly wished he could try one on, seeming to have the idea that I'd give him more power.

Yet when Itachi handed him the article of clothing, he smirked on the inside. Even though it seemed trivial to others, this seemed like a big step for him. He's said earlier that he only wanted to have their jutsus, which in reality, was only half the truth. His other goal, that still seemed a little hazy, was to take over the organization and place him on top. But that was still much later into the future.

He was brought back to earth when he saw Itachi lean down to pick up a fairly small box, opening it to reveal numerous colors of nail polish. Naruto held down a scoff and looked around at the array of colors before spotting a rusty orange and roughly grabbing it, causing the other glass bottles to lightly jingle together.

Not soon after, Naruto was outside of the cave, Itachi and Kisame in front of him. Itachi did a simple nod, Naruto giving a deep bow in return, before jumping off into the forest. Kisame, on the other hand, favored to use his favorite hand sign of the middle finger before leaping off, and so not seeing Naruto do it right back at him.

"Finally, I thought I'd never get any alone time." He said aloud after a few minutes, knowing that the two older shinobi wouldn't be able to hear him anymore.

"**When you think about it, you haven't had any time alone in over five years."** Kyuubi corrected.

"Especially with you popping in and out of my thoughts." Naruto joked and he inspected the container of nail polish more carefully. For world-class criminals, they sometimes seemed like a bunch of fags to him.

"**I can't _wait_**** for you to paint you nails."** Kyuubi practically purred as he saw the bottle of orange paint.

"Shut up, we need to get down to business." Naruto said as he put the small bottle into one of the numerous pocket holders in the jacket.

"**What do you suppose we do?"** Kyuubi asked lazily, Naruto imagining him laying on his back behind the bars in his sewer like mind.

"We need coverage to find out where Orochimaru's lair is…so I need to split up." Naruto concluded as he started doing various hand signs so fast that it wouldn't have been visible to the naked eye.

In a puff of smoke, now nine identical Naruto stood in a circle starring at each other, their long coats ruffling with the slight wind. The true Naruto smirked at his doubles, knowing that this technique was fairly flawless. He had actually thought of the idea when he'd seen Pein's six different bodies while he was training with the leader, inspiring him to make his own way to split his body apart. It was fairly simple, as all he did was first create doppelgangers like he used to do so long ago. He then split his soul into nine even parts, keeping a little bit more for his true self. But what made the clones so powerful was, along with separating Naruto's own powers and knowledge, he'd perfected how to separate the Kyuubi's powers as well. So now these each held one tail of the mighty beast to use at their disposal, making them easily stronger then any Jounin or ANBU. But what was unique to the true Naruto was that he was the only one who had the true Kyuubi in his mind talking to him and still had most of Kyuubi's power. This was essential in controlling the other eight because, like his own personality, it was likely one would go a-wall since they had their own free thinking and then power to back it up. With Naruto still being stronger, it stirred fear into them so that they didn't rebel.

"Men!" the true Naruto said as he walked in the middle of the circle, all the others standing up as straight and tall as possible, hands stiff at their sides.

"I want you to scout, two for each principal shinobi territory. One and two for stone, three and four for mist and fog, five and six for sand, and seven and eight for cloud. Leave the fire area to me." He said, moving his eyes to look at each single-minded clone "And if you find something that's even remotely related to Orochimaru, send me a mental message. As always, _do whatever it takes_." He finished his short orders, motioning for them to go, as they did all at once with a blast of chakra.

"**I'm glad you created that. Makes information gathering **_**much**_** less tedious."** Kyuubi remarked before yawning. Although he didn't show it, it slightly strained him to have his power separated and so drawn out, making the fox feel the slightest tinge of vulnerability.

"Hey, the hardest part is actually left for us." Naruto snorted, slightly annoyed at how lazy the fox was being when he had another great opportunity to grasp, not questioning _why_ the fox was so tired.

"**Have fun with that Kit. I'm going back to sleep." **The demon told before another beastly yawn was heard in Naruto's mind that was followed by nothing but silence.

"So all I have to do is keep a constant supervision on all of the clones, and then search the most likely place myself. And the place where Orochimaru would have the most ties is Kohana of coarse." Naruto said out loud as he jumped into the forest, rather to say it then think it as it might wake Kyuubi.

"This is going to be such a pain." Naruto groaned, not much after his sprint had started (even though his spot was 200 miles away), as he starred down into the bustling city of Kohana from the top of a high tree.

"I guess since I used a jutsu derived from Pein…I'll use the next one from his partner Konan." Naruto thought with a smirk. He quickly did numerous hand signs with ease until another puff of smoke erupted.

With this jutsu, very similar to how Konan could turn and multiply herself with paper, he made his body as thin (or even more) as paper. This allowed him to be practically invisible at the right angle, and no place was without his entering if it had the slightest crack. Plus his body was now virtually weightless, this aspect being what he wanted right now.

He stretched out his 2-D body and let the wind catch him, slowly but surely getting closer to being above Kohana. From this bird's eye view, he could tell that the village was fairly prosperous. But he didn't linger long on the sightseeing as the Hokage building (where he truly wanted to be) was easily in sight and range. With his hands so thin, it was impossible to create any hand signs to change, and didn't want to release the jutsu or else he would fall and create a commotion (the last thing he wanted). But thankfully he was used to this jutsu and so adjusted his body like a sail until he drifted onto the Hokage building's roof.

With a little difficulty, he managed to shakily stand up and move towards the door, slipping through the slight crack. Once he was inside, he released the jutsu and his body popped back into the usual 3-D proportions. A few seconds after that one was released, with his now formed hands, he did even more hand signs, this time the jutsu was targeted at invisibility.

It actually wasn't invisibility, but being able to reflect the light that would hit him and so reveal him. Once he finished the long line of hand signs, he looked down at his feet to notice it start to slowly creeping up until it engulfed his entire body. Now in his stealthy state, he started to quietly walk down the stairs and then hallways, making sure not to bump into anyone. Finally, he arrived at the Hokage's room. Waiting until a woman with short black hair opened the door, he snuck in just before she closed the door. Naruto slowly walked to one of the corners of the room, where it was dark and so there was less light to reflect.

"Hokage-sama, here's more paperwork for you to do." The black haired woman said with a sigh as she dropped her heavy load on the wide wooden desk that was already piled high with paper.

"Thank you Shizune, you may go now." The young woman said behind the desk, her low pigtails swinging as she shook her head in anger, or frustration? Naruto didn't really know, and didn't really care.

The now identified Shizune made a leave for the door, but stopped as she suddenly looked down where Naruto's feet would be and then looking up, as if almost seeing him. A sudden pang of dread filled Naruto's stomach, but when Shizune started laughing, it was replaced with intense confusion and slight irritation.

"Come on Tonton, nothing's there." Shizune said as her gaze went down to Naruto's feet again. He looked down himself and held down a gag as he saw a small pig at his feet, smelling him with his sensitive nose. In his hurry, he'd accidentally let the tiniest of his smell drift out. Immediately double checking anything that would give him away, he only found the slightest crack in his scent. Closing it up in a hurry, he was glad that the wide windows were open so it would blow away his scent.

"I said come ON." Shizune groaned as she approached Naruto and the pig, scooping up the pig in her arms before leaving, the door giving a slight click and silencing the squealing of the pig's protests.

Naruto had gone into the office at around four, and it was now eleven. He would usually be able to hold this jutsu for a week, while doing other things, easily, but since his and Kyuubi's powers were fractioned off earlier this morning, he was feeling a little strained.

Finally, the blond Hokage started drifting off, her head banging against the wooden desk as she started losing consciousness from the immense work. In the next half an hour, she finally left the office in drowsiness, thinking to herself that she would take some time to sleep on her bed (as she usually fell asleep on the paperwork).

Waiting until in it was twelve, Naruto released the jutsu with a sigh of relief. He didn't waste a second as he leaped to a door where he knew all the information of Konoha, and many other villages, was held. He quickly picked the lock with his claw like nail (another enhancement with merging more with Kyuubi) and darted into the darkness, closing the door with the faintest of a creak.

He looked around in the dark, already having the ability of perfect night vision, and briskly started looking at the filling letters, looking for 'O' so he could look up Orochimaru. Within a minute, he was at the filing cabinet and had silently opened the metal drawer. Filling through the many manila folders with thin fingers, making sure his claws didn't snag anything, he finally arrived at Orochimaru which was conveniently marked with a red tag, which he could only guess was identifying him as a top-enemy shinobi.

He ripped it out and unzipped his black coat, slipping the folder into another pocket as he'd done with the nail polish. He was about to leave, seeming as he had nothing else to do, but found as he took a step closer to the door, his eye caught the letter 'N' on the file cabinet that was next to the 'O' one. He stopped his walking, thinking of his own name, before whirling around, his long bangs doing nothing to hide the spark that was suddenly set off in his cerulean eyes.

Quickly sauntering over to one of the cabinets in the back, he approached the one he desired. The one that held everything under 'U'. He soundlessly opened this file cabinet drawers and it didn't take him long, again, until he found his own last name. He pulled out the folder and opened it, only to find the face of a beautiful orange haired kunoichi who was being held by, if he remembered right, the Fourth Hokage.

He was about to put it back, but suddenly noticed how he resembled the Hokage so much, especially at his current age. Deciding against his better judgment, he slid this one into his jacket. He looked down and found the folder behind the one he'd just pocketed had 'Uzumaki' on it too. Taking this one out, he opened it to see a picture of him in his youthful age of 12, face-paint and all. With a groan at his old immaturity, he glided this one into his long coat again before walking towards the door for the second time.

Pressing his ear to the door to make sure no one was in the room again (he could tell if they were breathing) while checking for chakra output too, he opened it before closing it again when he'd decided the coast was clear. He let his hand dwindle on the knob for a little, thinking of how he hadn't placed dummy folders so that he wouldn't be suspicious of anything. But he smirked, deciding to be bold yet again, and decided to leave it be. Let them _try_ find out on their own. He hadn't left a trace this entire time except for the slightest scent that was blown away long ago.

Jumping out of the still wide open windows into the pitch darkness, he starting to jump from roof to roof without making the slightest of sound. He was only barely, or more like none at all, visible black blur through the night that no one would see.

Without any trouble getting through the large village, he stopped on the outside wall, allowing himself to take a double take at his home that he'd once held so dear to him. He snorted as he remembered he would have died for this rotten hell that he used to think was a sanctuary, but was really just a wasteland full of judgmental people.

Sickened with himself that he'd spent more time then necessary starring into the village, he jumped out back into the forest where it felt more like home. The darkness became like a blanket the feel over him and allowed him, to feel what he thought was, peace.

X - X - X

"Ah, it's so-o nice waking up by myself and not to fish-breath or any other psycho." Naruto said with a sigh as he looked up at the sky, it now a gentle blue, Naruto guessing it to be around ten or eleven. He had dozed off at about four in the morning in a tall field of grass, the long stalks now balmy blowing in the wind.

"He was so shocked when he saw how much I'd grown I think he suppressed his surprise with envy." Naruto laughed, remembering Kisame's variously expressions, especially when he'd called him a shark tramp and he'd had no idea what he'd meant.

"**Stop that laughing, it's woken me up."** Kyuubi growled inside Naruto's head. Naruto sighed as he realized he'd laughed on the inside instead of the outside. He guessed after five years of the no-talking-or-emotion-on-the-outside-unless-asked-to-do-so policy that every person of the organization (except Tobi) had ordered had given him the habit of holding everything in.

"Oh _please_, you've been asleep for almost an entire day now." Naruto said out loud, liking it better when he outwardly spoke to Kyuubi then when he inwardly thought to the fox.

"**That's only because the jutsu is…slightly hard on my own chakra levels. And you doing all the fancy jutsus yesterday didn't help at ALL."**

Naruto hinted on the slight hiss, instead of a growl, on his voice and knew that he was being serious and not joking around like he usually did.

"Well you should have told me before, I'd have been more careful." Naruto said aloud, looking up as eight sparrows flew by in a small flock in search of a better field of grass seeds.

"**So are we going to do anything else rather than pointlessly using up all our chakra?" **The nine-tails continued to hiss, Naruto's hinted apology doing nothing to cool down his pissed off state.

"No…we're going to read the folders I stole, see if my splits (clones) have found anything valuable, and regroup." Naruto answered as he started his morning stretches, sighing as his back cracked in nine simultaneous pops.

"**If you're trying to make me feel better it's not helping…"** The Kyuubi growled, making Naruto grin. No more hissing.

"Who said if was?" Naruto snorted as he jumped into and up a two hundred foot tree, allowing him, as he sat on the top, to see for miles on end.

Sneaking a hand into his large overcoat, he rested his hands onto the first of the folders on the stack, which was the one on himself.

"Lets see what they say about me…" Naruto said with a hint of curiosity, as he could tell Kyuubi was also intrigued.

Naruto's perfectly sharp eyes scanned the various papers for anything that sounded important. Grades at the school…Team 7…number of missions he'd done…failed Chûnin Exams…presumed death with capture form the Akaktsuki. He snorted, the few papers on his overall history giving him nothing important and so sorted them into the back. The next page, though, caught his eye as it held his heritage and family tree. He ignored the top half and focused on the last bracket where the names Minato Namikaze ('The Forth Hokage', or Yondaime, below it in parentheses) and Kushina Uzumaki were, a line from both connecting with Naruto's own name. At the sight of the name of one of the folders he'd taken, his eyebrow slightly rose. But when he saw that he was the son of the legendary Hokage, his eyes widened and his other eyebrow shot up to be with the other.

"**So you finally found out that the Fourth is you father. _Hallelujah_****."** Kyuubi said nonchalantly in his head.

"You knew?!" Naruto snarled, angry in how he shared everything with Kyuubi and yet the demon rarely shared anything of his own history or knowledge to Naruto.

"**Of course, he was the bastard who sealed me in you anyway. He actually had the spin to ask me to take care of you."** Kyuubi replied with a smart-aleck aura.

"Well…fuck you fox." Naruto said without any real emotion, his anger already passing at the sound of the fox acting like his guardian, which was entirely true as he thought it over. If not for the fox…he didn't want to even think about it.

"**Yeah, yeah, same to you Kit."** The Kyuubi replied, inwardly smirking behind the cage bars at Naruto's now mixed emotions.

"**So are you going to open the other two?"** Kyuubi growled a few minutes later, Naruto having zoned out and blankly starring at his family tree, noticing how all the members were from Kohana except for his father's father (his grandfather) and his mother, whose village nationality was not listed.

"Yeah, yeah." Naruto said automatically, slapping the folder closed, putting it back before taking out the one of his supposed mother.

"**Ah, yes, I remember _her_****."** Kyuubi hissed as he looked through Naruto's eyes at the picture of the happy young couple, her belly big with Naruto.

"You knew her too?" Naruto asked exasperatedly as he looked over the other two papers in the folder. Rather then her physical exams during her pregnancy and her short history at the village, as she'd wondered into Kohana from a place unknown and lived lazily (not really a citizen) before meeting the Fourth and marrying him, thus becoming a citizen of the leaf village, she had nothing else on her.

"**Yes, yes. Actually, I didn't specifically know her as an individual extremely well, more like an acquaintance, but I knew her ****fucktarded****, pathetic excuse of a village." **Kyuubi continued to bristle. Naruto blinked as he realized he'd never heard the fox, even close, to how angry he was right now. It was so enormous that his dark chakra was accidentally seeping into Naruto's body, making his eyes turn a fiery orange and his body lightly glow with red chakra yet again.

"Kyuubi, get a hold of yourself." Naruto ordered calmly, making sure to keep his voice even as to not express how he was apprehensive on when Kyuubi got mad. The last time he remembered was in the first year of training, when he was thirteen, and had gotten overly frustrated and angry at Itachi that he'd allowed too much of Kyuubi into him and he'd blacked out and had awoken with Kisame threatening to cut his head off with his sword at his thin neck. Both of the rouge-ninja never told him what had happened to this day.

"**If you'd gone through what they did, or more like _tired_**** to do, with me you'd be just as angry as me. The wounds are still fresh, if you know what I mean." **Kyuubi finally replied after a few minutes of silence, Naruto sighing as his voice was even and not full of bloodlust, yet Naruto could still tell it was thick with emotion.

"Oh, well that-" But Naruto cut himself off as he heard a ding in his head, putting a few fingers to his temple.

"Too bad, Kyuubi, but one of my splits, number two, has contacted me. Your story will have to wait." Naruto said quickly, inwardly a little disappointed. He was hoping in not only learning about more of himself, but also of Kyuubi's past which he always thought would be full of adventure and advice.

/"What is it?"/ Naruto answered in telepathy to his split self.

_/"Leader, I've found a lead in this town on the edge of the stone territory. They said that Orochimaru was just here about a month ago and was supposedly heading to his lair in his own village Hidden in the Sound."/_ The facet of Naruto said in an instructing voice, full of obedience.

/"Well done."/ Naruto said as he cut off their connection and flipped on his straw hat, the paper hangings lightly blowing in the wind.

"**Whatever happened to relaxing?"** Kyuubi half-heartedly growled, flipping over onto his back to stare at the dripping ceilings in his prison.

"We can do that AFTER we kill the snake-homo." Naruto said as he closed his eyes and stood up on the branch, bringing his hands together. He found the location of the second clone, finding it too far away to run to quickly. Groaning, he knew he had to do his other way of transportation with the clones. After a long series of hand signs, he suddenly felt like his heart was being ripped out of his chest. In a split second, he was standing on new ground, feeling the full power of all his chakra and also the happy purr of Kyuubi in the back of his mind at having all his tails back to him. What he'd just done, to over simplify it, was move his soul and physical body into that of the second Naruto clone while at the same time dispersing all of the other seven parts that were no longer necessary.

"Not only does that use up ten percent of my own chakra, it always makes me slightly sick." Naruto groaned as he slouched against the trunk of a tree where he could see the village that his facet had told him about.

"**I can't believe you're blowing me off…ungracious brat…"** Naruto heard Kyuubi mutter under his breath, Naruto already imagining him with his lip curled back as he heard a snarl of annoyance.

"Relax Kyuubi, this won't take long." Naruto said with a smirk of arrogance, dropping to the forest floor without a sound, not even disturbing a rabbit that was nibbling on grass less than three meters away.

Naruto leaned down so that his nose was practically touching the grass, closing his eyes to concentrate on the array of scents that assaulted his sensitive nose. Finally, after about a half an hour of filtering through all the scents, he picked up the disgustingly familiar scent of Orochimaru, which just stunk of snakes and evil. Yet when he focused on his vile scent, he also found that (if he remembered correctly) Sasuke's scent was mingled in as well. There was a third male's scent that seemed eerily familiar too, but he couldn't place it just yet. Grinning like a fool who had won the lottery, he sped off after the three scents, knowing that they couldn't be over two hundred miles away, which would only take him less then three or four hours.

/"Kyuubi, feel free to tell me that story of yours."/ Naruto thought as he ran, knowing that if he talked the wind would steal his voice.

"**You've lost the opportunity brat. Another time." **The still irked spirit answered before giving off an aura that clearly stated leave-me-alone-or-die.

Naruto sighed, knowing a great opportunity had been sacrificed for the sake of another, before continuing on in his leaps across the vast forest.

X - X - X

It didn't take Naruto long, as he'd thought, to catch up to the small traveling group of three, all wearing long hooded cloaks as to hide their faces and bodies. Yet Naruto could tell it was them…his nose NEVER failed him. Yet he held down the urge to pounce on them. He knew that one part was to kill Orochimaru, but the other was to get the ring, and that meant that he needed them to go to their lair, and so was allowing them to lead him right to it.

On the third day of traveling, Naruto was starting to get irritated for two reasons. One, because he hadn't slept for this entire time and two, because they could have been there already if the three weren't going at, what seemed to Naruto, to be an extremely sluggish pace.

But finally as sunset started painting the sky on that third day, the small traveling group entered what seemed to be the entryway to an underground mansion. Smirking in his victory, he waited until it was well into the dark night before entering. Being extremely careful as he approached and stopped at the snake embroidered entryway, he starred down into the hall that lead him underground, yet looked more like a black abyss then anything else.

Yet Naruto had lost the emotion of fear long ago. So, without a moment of vacillation, he leapt into the darkness, allowing his already adjusted eyes to lead him the way. Still following his nose, he stayed on the trail of the three shinobi. At seeing the numerous jail like cells along the way, it spiked his curiosity as to what they were being used for. It also irked him that this wasn't really much of a challenge as no one had noticed him from his chakra masking and that there were no guards to beat up.

Finally, he came to a place where the scents ended, making him silently smirk in satisfaction. Grimacing as the door creaked when he opened it, he slipped into a pitch black room. He glanced around at the multiple shelves lined with jars that held everything from the human body, he finally allowed his hands to focus on what seemed like a mummified hand. But it wasn't the hand he was interested in, but the ring that was positioned on the pinkie finger.

Quickly looking around the room to check for any traps, he advanced towards the ring, not even his cloak making a sound. Resisting the urge to snort at the decayed human part, he used his long nails to wedge the ring off the crusty finger, almost sneering when the finger accidentally feel off right as he took the ring from the tip. Without a second glance, he strode back to the doorway. But as he closed it and turned around, he was almost surprised to find a dark figure approaching.

"What do we have here…?" It asked in amusement. Naruto furrowed his brows as he saw the figure arrange their large glasses that somehow flashed in the darkness.

"I think all we have here is a pussy." Naruto stated back as he pointed at the cloaked figure, sensing in satisfaction how it tensed.

"No. I believe all we have right here is a poor thief who couldn't complete even half of his mission." The person replied in a superior tone, as if talking to Naruto was like talking to an eight year old.

Naruto finally realized who it was at the odd tone. The person who had helped his old team in the forest of death in the Chûnin Exams…Kabuto. Just as he thought that, the hood was flown back and Naruto's guess was correct.

"Just old Kabuto. And here I was hoping that you'd be Orochimaru…or at least Sasuke." Naruto sighed in annoyance, feeling as if he'd been drastically let down.

"How do you know me? Who are you?" Kabuto growled, making Naruto realize how he'd MUCH rather hear Kyuubi growl then this fake imposter.

"Someone from you past." Naruto said vaguely as he discarded his straw hat and descended on the older shinobi, making Kabuto flip back in defense.

Naruto didn't waste time in letting some of the Kyuubi's power seep through, giving him the advantage to his strength while allowing Kyuubi to have the amusement of fighting on his own through his chakra that encircled the blond. Naruto would usually like to play with his opponents, but in this case, he just wanted to get this over with a s quickly as possible.

Kabuto activated his own glowing blue hands, making drastic attempts to touch Naruto and so disturb his chakra flow. Yet Naruto never gave him that opportunity. Close combat was something that Naruto excelled at, and Kabuto wasn't going to be the one to bring him down. With a solid kick from Naruto, Kabuto was flung on the hard stone wall, coughing up blood as he felt some of his ribs had been broken from the chakra enhanced kick.

"It's all over Kabuto." Naruto said with satisfaction as Kabuto tried to heal his broken chest.

"What are you talking about? My healing abilities are second to none." Kabuto barked in arrogance, wiping a trail of blood from his mouth as he shakily stood.

"You just don't understand. With that kick I sent some of my demon's chakra into you. I'm used to it's darkness because I've lived with it my entire life, but if it enters someone else, like you right now, it slowly and painfully eats you from the inside out." Naruto said with a growl of amusement.

Kabuto's eyes widened as he suddenly doubled over, this time puking a large amount of blood.

"What…what chakra is this?" He struggled to say as darkness, not from the outside, started to overcome his sight.

Naruto smirked and unzipped his jacket so that his bottom half of his face was now visible, his trademark whiskers visible even in the darkness.

"N-Naruto?!" Kabuto continued to struggle to say through wheezing breathes.

"Feel grateful." Naruto said as cracked his knuckles menacingly, his long nails painfully sharp. Kabuto didn't have a chance to reply before Naruto lunged forward, surrounding his nails with Kyuubi's chakra, and so easily severing the medical-nin's head from his body.

He watched as the head rolled a few feet before stopping, Kabuto's eyes still wide in surprise, pain, and fear. Without even a trace of emotion on Naruto's own face, he zipped up his long jacket and continued on his way to the exit, picking up his hat as he went.

When he felt the cool breeze caress his face through the paper slips when he finally reached the surface, he snorted in distain. He had been taught in the organization that stealth and creating as little commotion as possible was always the objective, yet Naruto always loved a good battle and being severely outnumbered. To put it simply, he loved strutting his stuff and showing off.

Purposely allowing a little of his chakra aura to slip out, he jumped out into the forest. After a minute of running, he closed off his chakra again so that they couldn't follow him for too long. Going for another two hours of running, he finally stopped as he saw a small cave hidden by a willow's low leaves and thick roots.

Almost entirly exhausted, he crawled into the little hole in the ground, not even noticing the thick cover of moss on the cave floor that made it seem like he was sleeping in a bed.

/"Kyuubi…?"/ Naruto called out in his brain drowsily.

"**Yes Kit?"** Kyuubi asked back. He had known to keep quiet during this entire mission, knowing from previous experiences that it was bad when he interfered as it distracted Naruto. To tell the truth, he didn't really mind watching from the sidelines right now since it was mostly all irrelevant and pointless to the demon fox.

/"Can you stay up and watch for enemies?"/ Naruto said, having a rare favor to ask of the powerful nine-tails.

"**Sleep."** Kyuubi rumbled deeply, making Naruto sigh in relief.

Naruto allowed himself to reminisce for a second on how fast the wheels of his life were turning, and found it utterly exciting. His eyelids now feeling like the heaviest things in the world, his blue eyes were shut off from the world as he started to doze off.

"**Sweet dreams."** The Kyuubi joked at the last minute.

Naruto would have scoffed in amusement, if he hadn't already been fast asleep.

* * *

Glossary/Notes:

B.U.B. - stands for 'broody uncommunicative bastard.'

ADHD – stands for 'attention deficit hyperactive disorder'

Bozu - squirt, little kid

Shoji - sliding paper doors

Iwagakure - Village Hidden Among the Rocks

* * *

A/N: First off, THANK YOU very much for reading my story and I hope that it was at least a little interesting as I'm trying something that I haven't really seen in this fandom yet. Have questions? Ask them in a review and I'll be sure to answer them as best as I can. Rather then that...take what you will from this story and feedback of any kind is appreciated.


	2. Faint Resemblance

**Chapter 2 : Faint Resemblance**

_I'm not listening to you now, I wasn't listening to you then.  
I know that nothing will be the same again.  
There's only so much I can handle, only so much I can take.  
Have we been here before?  
Will we be here again?  
I don't know how much more of me you expect..._

* * *

Naruto awoke to the sound of soft footsteps. Suddenly on alert, he snapped open his brilliantly blue eyes but didn't move right away. Blinking a few times to allow his eyes to do their quick adjust, he starred at the moss underneath him before slowly moving his head up to look outside. It was hard to see through the many, long trails of leaves from the willow, but when the wind blew he could catch glimpses of the outside.

He waited in anticipation for the wind to blow again so he could see the outside, and when it finally did he saw that it was only a lone adolescent buck he'd heard, and so he let a sigh of relief go through his lips.

/"What the FUCK Kyuubi?!"/ Naruto yelled inside of himself as he got up from his lain down position and into the morning sunlight, causing the deer to prick it's ears towards him before going back to eating it's grass, deeming him not an enemy. Naruto continued up the tall willow that was hiding the cave with it's roots, deciding to sit on one of the broad branches.

**"What?"** The fox replied lazily back, himself picking his teeth with a claw while starring at a dripping wall through the steel bars.

/"I told you to look out for enemies!"/ Naruto steamed in his mind, moving his head to look down into the small clearing where the deer still was nibbling. Maybe he should kill it for lunch, he hadn't eaten for a good week now when he thought about it.

**"Last time I checked, deer aren't exactly our enemies." **Kyuubi said with a breezy snort. Naruto was going to ask for the plural, but stopped as he saw a few more deer, no doubt does, come into the clearing to joint the male.

/"You could have at least told me that they weren't harmful so I could skip the whole heart attack."/ Naruto thought his reason right back as he watched a fowl practice bucking.

**"Oh, then get ready for another one."**

/"Why? Is a big tiger going to come and eat these herbavores any time soon?"/

**"As much as I like watching survival of the fittest between animals, I like watching it even more when _humans_**** do it."**

"What are you talking about?" Naruto actually groaned out as he rolled his head around a few times to stretch, it being a little stiff from not having a pillow last night.

**"Kukuku...let me see. The REAL enemies, not these grass eating lumps of meat, are coming in about…hm…seven minutes?"** Kyuubi crackled.

Naruto was speechless for a second before a roar escaped his lips, unable to hold it in, causing the peaceful deer to suddenly bolt to only god knows where.

/"How?"/ He asked inside himself as he jumped up higher on the willow so that he could see farther.

**"You may have hidden your chakra…but I didn't hide **_**mine**_** last night while you were asleep. It's been accumulating in this one point for about ten hours now. Even if we were twice as far away from that underground mansion, they would have still found us." **Kyuubi said with smirk of satisfaction in his words.

/"What the FUCK is your _PROBLEM_?!"/ Naruto ferally yelled, the words echoing in his head.

**"I wanna fight you brat, what do you _THINK_?!"** Kyuubi growled right back, starting to get annoyed at how this brat of a teenager was talking back to him.

Naruto was silent for a second before doing a few jutsus, his invisibility one from before, and then one that encased him in a (also invisible) bubble that didn't let anything in or anything out (for the most part). This would successfully hide both his and Kyuubi's chakra for the time being and his physical body from the naked eye.

Lastly, he slouched against the tree trunk and closed his eyes and assumed the position of meditating. Within a few seconds, he was in front of the huge cage that held the demon inside him in.

**"Well, well. Came to give me a visit, did you? I feel SO honored..." **Kyuubi purred in delight, obviously extremely amused on how everything was turning out in the demon's favor.

Naruto was silent as he glared up at the immense animal, seeing it's nine tails sway behind it and how it's giant red eyes gleamed in the dark light.

"You're going to be cut off for a week." Naruto sharply stated as he felt around in his black jacket.

Kyuubi starred at him blankly before all out laughing, the entire sewer like environment shaking with his loud roars of amusement.

**"Ah, you crack me up sometimes Kit."** Kyuubi said with a snarl as he bared his teeth; fangs hanging past his chin.

Naruto continued to stay silent as he revealed a small piece of paper from his jacket and bravely started walking forward to the cage.

**"Just for amusement, I'm going to let you try so I can laugh at your failure."** Kyuubi said with a smirk as he held down the urge to claw the ungrateful teenager.

Still with a straight face, the blond jumped up and slapped the small piece of paper right next to the one his father had done seventeen years ago. Immediately, an electrical barrier of gold was added to the cage bars, filling in the gaps and making it a glowing, transparent wall.

Kyuubi howled angrily, feeling cheated, behind the gold and rammed against it, but was electrocuted and shot back with, now, burnt fur and, subsequently, pride. The fox starred at the electrical-current barrier before pure, uncontained rage filled him.

**"You little _SHIT_****!"** the fox yelled as he starred down at the ninja.

Naruto leaned forward and cupped his ear with his hand, a puzzling expression on his face.

"What _fox_? I can't hear you." Naruto darkly laughed as he crossed his arms.

"Oh, but you can hear ME perfectly well, can't you?" Naruto continued as he looked down at his nails before bringing out his small nail polish bottle, deciding that now was the time to paint his nails.

**"How DARE you! I am the LORD of all tailed be-"** But the Kyuubi was interrupted by Naruto who couldn't hear him and so had started talking again.

"This is one of the seals that the Akatsuki uses on containers like me that would subdue the demon until it's time to take that demon out." Naruto easily explained as he started on his right hand, already done with the left.

"You see, you won't be able to have ANY connection to me for the next seven days. Pity that it doesn't last longer, don't you think?" Naruto said with a pout as he blew on his now perfectly finished nails, his steady hands having no problem painting the smooth surfaces.

Kyuubi could do nothing but growl before ramming against the barrier again, and so getting blown back with even more burns as before.

"See you in a week then." Naruto said with a smirk as he turned around to leave and bring himself back to the world.

Snapping his eyes open for the second time that day, he scanned down from the trees to see that two figures were coming close, in now only a two mile radius. Jumping down from the tree and releasing both his jutsus, he started to run and look for an open field or something similar to fight on, knowing he wanted something open because he was best at close combat, plus he needed to finish this quickly. With a few hand signs in a second, he intentionally released all his cloaking jutsus so that it'd be extremely easy for them to follow and find him.

Within another two minutes, he found a nice grass opening, tall pine trees lining the almost perfectly round flat ground. He stood there for a minute anticipating his enemies' entrance as he flexed his clawed hands, finding it slightly odd to not have Kyuubi talking in his mind with him.

Finally, the two figures dropped in front of him silently, squashing the green grass with their black shinobi slippers.

"Ah…so it's only an Akatsuki member." Orochimaru hissed as he licked his lips with his long tongue, making Naruto already want to rip it out.

"Who are you?!" the second figure snapped, Naruto finding in amusement that it was Sasuke. Throughout the years, he was similar to how Naruto had grown. His hair was now fairly long and he had a tall and muscular body, more filled out then Naruto, who was lanky and didn't really seem to have much muscle at all.

"Answer me demon." Sasuke snapped as he took a step forward, a hand on his sword that was attached to his hip from a thick purple string, his outfit very similar to Orochimaru's, which made Naruto hold down a gag. One, in how creepy they looked matching and two, in how they had the worst fashion sense ever. Even, if possible, more faggish then the Akatsuki's nail polish.

"You know me too well Sasuke-_teme_." Naruto said as he took a step forward himself, using a surname he hadn't said in quiet a while. He could see Sasuke's eyes twitch in annoyance before widening in recollection.

"So you _do_ remember me, _oh dear teammate_? I am _TRULY_ honored." Naruto barked out sharply as he unbuttoned part of his jacket collar to reveal his all-too-familiar face to Sasuke.

"N-No way…" Sasuke muttered out, not being able to help but stutter. Naruto wanted to laugh at how Sasuke tried SO very hard to hold back the obvious emotion that filtered through his chocked out words.

"Ah yes…and I expect that you though I died like everyone else?" Naruto said as his eyes filtered to Orochimaru who was just standing there idly, making Naruto wonder if he was the real thing.

"How? You…" Sasuke continued to struggle to say, his hand now slightly shaking as it still gripped his samari-like sword.

"It don't matter." Naruto slurred out as one of his long canines brushed his bottom lip as he smirked, "For I'm here to take that head on your Sensei." Naruto snarled out, his smirk now so wide that Sasuke could see all of his maniacally sharp fang like teeth.

"I can't allow that." Sasuke said as he finally unsheathed his sword, the metal lightly glimmering in the midday sunlight.

"Oh well…I always _DID_ want to fight you. Kick your little pretty-boy ass back to queer land." Naruto said with a sigh before standing up straight, waiting for Sasuke to attack him.

"Why don't you get ready to attack me?" Sasuke growled, his eyes blinking as Naruto's forehead protector's glare shone in his eyes for a second, the carved straight line still easily visible.

"I _am_ ready. Two legs will be enough to defeat you." Naruto said lightly, deciding to have at least a little fun with his prey this time, unlike with Kabuto.

Sasuke was quiet for a second before he bound up, the crunch of grass under his feet accompanied with the distinctive sound of metal slicing the air.

Naruto easily back flipped to avoid the sword, intentionally being a little lagging as to allow the sword to barely brush against his long bangs, causing adrenaline start seeping into his body. Sasuke didn't wait another second before attacking again just as Naruto landed on his feet. Naruto easily sidestepping each jab or swing that Sauske sent his way, a passive expression on his face the entire time. In a desperate attempt, Sasuke lunged for Naruto's shins, making the blond jump in the air. While in mid-air, Naruto did a 360 spin and connected his fast moving foot with Sasuke's pale face with a crack.

The Uchiha skidded a good twenty feet before finally stopping, his white kimono now adorned with grass stains and mud. Sasuke spat out a little blood, a leering grin on his face.

"You've gotten much better." He said as he walked to grab his sword that he'd let go of in his short flight, jerking it out of the soft soil.

"It _has_ been five years. And I have been training under the best, unlike _some_ people." Naruto snidely replied right back, flexing his toes underneath his sandals out of habit when he was trying to keep alert.

"And who is this 'best'?" Sasuke scoffed as he got close to Naruto again, widening his legs in preparation to pounce.

Naruto closed his eyes for a second, getting ready to savor the next moment before saying, "Your brother. Itachi Uchiha." He opened his eyes just in time to see Sasuke's face fall the tiniest bit. Naruto held down a sigh of annoyance. He had been expecting so much more from the raven haired teen.

"He's MUCH better then you. Compared to him, you give your family SHAME while he gives it HONOR." Naruto bravely said as he himself took a few steps closer, hoping his mocks would pierce his old friend's stone heart, or pride. Naruto actually preferred the later.

"You have_ NO IDEA_ what you're saying." Sasuke snarled, his curse mark creating black flames across his body before turning his skin to turn a sickly grey, his hair elongating and changing to a frosty white. Naruto yawned in boredom as he starred into his black and red eyes, three deadly wheels spinning in each sharingan.

"_Pa_-thetic. Depending on someone else for power." Naruto said as he held down another yawn.

"And what about your Fox?" Sasuke snarled, the raw power that was coursing through him making him start to feel arrogant. No one had survived while fighting against him when he was in this form.

"_Kyuubi_ has been sealed away for the time being. Only me baby." Naruto said with a foxy grin that would have made any girl swoon. But in this case, it only served to piss Sasuke off even more.

With a loud yell, Sasuke advanced on Naruto, attempting to lodge his sword into his stomach to kill him slowly and painfully. In a flash, he felt his metal pierce through Naruto's flesh and go out the other side, Sasuke looking up in amusement to find Naruto's face contorted in surprise and agony.

"Not so tough, now are you?" Sasuke darkly chucked as he retracted his sword and kicked Naruto in the chest, causing him to fall down on the ground, red starting to seep into the ground.

"Well, at least I know _that_ jutsu works well in battle. _Thanks so much_ Sasuke."

Sasuke swirled his head to look over his shoulder to find Naruto behind him, his blue eyes sparkling dangerously. Without a second to move, Naruto kicked Sasuke in the back, causing the older of the two to fall on the ground in pain, feeling at least three of his vertebras broken from the kick. Sasuke glanced from the ground to Naruto's seemingly dead body that started to disintegrate into the grass.

"H-How?" Sasuke struggled to say as he got up, his eyes drifting from the corpse body to an alive and breathing Naruto.

"Simply, I made myself a clone, and so a new body, and transferred everything of myself into that. Sadly, it takes up a good chunk of chakra and at the moment I need to complete a mission. Now…" Naruto drifted off as he looked across the plain to where Orochimaru still stood, his tongue now hanging out of his mouth in surprise.

"What a despicable child you have become. That was a forbidden jutsu, was it not? Too bad you did it so quickly that I couldn't see all of it..." Orochimaru hissed as his white skin tightened while he smiled, his gold eyes dancing with fire that was being fueled by this current 'entertainment'.

"And what a despicable _freak of nature_ you're always been." Naruto said as he unbuttoned his jacket to throw down, knowing that he'd need his claws to at least cut open the old man's throat.

"You will not lay a hand on me without the help of your demon." Orochimaru said as he crossed his arms.

"Who says I need to use my _hands_?" Naruto stated as he held down a snort as his nails elongated into claws, before advancing. In the blink of an eye, he appeared in front of Orochimaru, just barely brushing the sannin's chest with a lung of his claws as the snake master back flipped away.

Naruto knew that Sasuke had emitted a large burst of chakra and soon shinobi who might be in the area would come to check it out. Naruto really didn't mind fighting, it was just that he knew he'd already spent thirty percent of his chakra with everything from this morning. While it looked easy, the seal actually was supplied by his OWN chakra and so he needed to give it a constant supply, so that meant around twenty percent at all times for the next seven days. Plus his fight with Sasuke, a subtraction of another ten percent thanks to his Soul Switching jutsu, and knew that he needed at least fifty percent to travel the long distance to Pain if he wanted to make it in two or three days. That only left ten percent to fight Orochimaru against and with no margin for error and no time for petty fights with other rough shinobi. He knew that if he wanted to defeat the sanin in a short time, he would have to come on extremely hard from the very beginning and end it before it even really began.

Snorting in annoyance as Orochimaru shot a hundred snakes at him from his mouth, Naruto took a deep breath before roaring with all this might, not only causing the snakes to disintegrate, but for Orochimaru to be shot through three thick-trunk-pines, stopping halfway through a forth. In the blink of an eye, Naruto was in front of Orochimaru, lightly panting as to try and regain his breathing from the extensive yell in which he felt like he'd yelled up his lungs.

But not wasting any time, Naruto flexed his right hand before crouching and swiping Orochimaru's head straight off his shoulders with precise claws. He starred at the beheaded corpse with disgust as thoughts of how this was too easy to be the real Orochimaru swam through his silent head. But when he looked down at the body and how it smelled exactly like it should, he nodded his head in affirmation.

Yet this affirmation was cut short as a sudden pang of pain shot through his body.

Looking down, he found a sword poking out a few inches above his left hip bone, luckily hitting nothing of vital importance. In fury, he grabbed the sword and pushed it out, twisting around to look at an exhausted Sasuke.

"You're so pathetic that I'm not even going to kill you myself." Naruto snarled as he crouched down, grabbing Sasuke around his neck and cutting off much of his oxygen. As the onyx haired one gasped for air, the blond lightly smirked.

"Should I castrate you? I do remember you saying you wanted to revive your clan…how would it feel if you got one of your dreams taken away…?" Naruto said as his eyes flickered with blue fire.

"No." Naruto continued to say as he blinked, an even grimmer smirk coming onto his young face. "Instead, I'm going to let you suffer by your own sword. A long and painful death. Seems fitting, doesn't it?" Naruto snarled as he took the sword and plunged it through Sasuke's stomach, making his face pale as blood gushed out of the open wound. Naruto twisted the sword, making Sasuke manage to weakly gasp in utter agony even with a lack of air. What Sasuke had wanted to do to Naruto, Naruto was doing to him. Definitely a case of irony at it's worst.

"This is goodbye. _Forever_." Naruto said as he flung him down, Orochimaru's head coincidentally laying not six feet from Sasuke's.

"N-Naruto…" Naruto heard Sasuke whisper just as he was about to bound away.

"What have you done to yourself?" Sasuke muttered breathlessly, his eyes becoming to look the slightest bit glassy and glazed over.

"You're a fucking, _bloody_ hypocrite." Naruto spat before going back to the clearing to pick up his coat. He looked down at his now not so trivial wound. It seemed to be bleeding quiet a lot, more then usual, and was soaking Naruto's clothes. But this was unimportant. What mattered now was reporting back directly to Pain, who he knew was deep into the land of stone, which was still quite a ways away since he was only on the border. He didn't have chakra to waste on healing a flesh wound that would heal on it's own.

He actually cursed himself for sealing Kyuubi away. If he was still present, his wound would have been healed the second he'd taken the sword out. And maybe the fight would have been even more fun. Kyuubi always did know how to draw out a fight and play with his opponents. On top of all that, he wouldn't have to limit his chakra limit to eighty percent since that stupid seal was taking up twenty all the time. Now recognizing the regret from his compulsive decision to imprison Kyuubi, Naruto snorted out of habit when something went astray. He had acted out of rash anger and annoyance at himself for not being clean enough, along with the for-longed feeling of paranoia, and on top of all that, how he'd felt betrayed. But Kyuubi _WAS _a demon, and he was only looking out to have a fun time.

Yet Naruto knew he couldn't take the seal off or he threatened to break his father's, too, since then were now intermingled until Naruto's one wore off, and the blond wasn't too queen to be fully possessed by Kyuubi anytime soon. Fuck. Why was everything so sticky?

Shaking his head of these thoughts, Naruto finally bounded out into the forest to continue. He almost missed a branch as he remembered he didn't have his hat with him. He must have left it at the cave. Stopping for a second, he thought it over. It was customary to throw away your hat when you were found out, but it would leave hard evidence in a place where there weren't any for miles. Any shinobi with half a brain would link that to the two murders. This would usually be alright, but for a murder at this magnitude and the criminal organization not wanting much attention, it was a problem. Especially since this was his first mission and he had to make sure _everything_ went right.

Cursing, he turned back in the direction where he knew the small cave was. Arriving at the place he'd left not an hour before, he crawled in and found his hat. Sick of the cramped space already, Naruto leapt out, tipping the hat on his head before taking off into the dark forest for a second time, ignoring the odd pangs from his wound that he'd never really felt before.

X - X - X

Sasuke, for the second time in his life, had no idea at what he should do. He closed his eyes in pain from both his body and his head, yet refused to cry out.

He struggled to rise, but found that he couldn't. He already knew the reason why: it was because he'd been stabbed with his own sword. He smirked in satisfaction that at least Naruto had been stabbed as well, even if it was for a moment. Because unlike a normal sword, his samurai sword was covered with a very special poison that Kabuto had made for him. It was odorless and almost sightless (only giving the sword a more sheen like look). The interesting thing with this venom was that it took a while to accumulate in the body and when it finally had gone through the entire blood stream, it shut down the body completely. By putting the body in a coma, it allowed Sasuke to take them for future use if need be without unnecessary injury.

Right now, Sasuke wasn't really worried about the injury, it could heal on it's own. And he would no doubt survive the coma like state that would last a normal ninja a month, but for him, it would usually be only a week. What he was wary about was how he was totally defenseless in the open woods, to both humans and animals with the smell of blood all over him and his excessive chakra output not five minutes ago.

But his current thinking was cut short as he head a gasp. Eyes now wide open, he starred at Orochimaru's head. Within a few seconds the eyes started blinking.

"S…Sasuke…" He heard his sensei slither out as the eyes rolled back and starred at him.

"How?" Sasuke gasped out himself, already feeling the poison start it's tranquilizer powers on his toes.

"You may cut off a snake's head…but it will survive for at least a few days more." Orochimaru sneered, his eyes dull. Sasuke actually wondered if his sensei was going to die and wasn't surprised to find that he hoped for it.

"But I can live inside of you…" Orochimaru said as his eyebrows furrowed, the Uchiha noticing a glint in his eyes that made Sasuke finally see that he was _far_ from dead. Damn.

"Why should I?" Sasuke snapped, trying his best to inch away from the decapitated head when he could still use his upper body.

"I have much power and knowledge Sasuke-kun. All that could be yours, and you wouldn't even know I was there. I'll just be in the back of your head…watching from the sidelines."

Sasuke looked up in the early afternoon sky, thinking it over. With Naruto obviously much more powerful then him…he needed to catch up and _fast_. Absorbing one of the legendary sanin…would defiantly be a great shortcut.

"Yes. But only if you agree that you don't interfere."

"Of course…I've already said that."

"Then do it already." Sasuke said in disgust at himself, closing his eyes again.

X - X - X

"Did you feel that? Kakashi-sensei?"

Kakashi stopped his running, skidding to a stop on a thick tree branch. The person who had asked the question landing silently next to him within a second of his own landing.

"I did." Kakashi replied quickly, not turning his head to look at his traveling partner.

"What should we do? That was huge blast of chakra."

"Well…what do _YOU_ want to do Sakura?" Kakashi asked as he turned his head to his last student.

The pink haired kunoichi turned away at the question, contemplating about it as she stared at the moss under her heeled feet. Something about that blast had been eerily familiar.

"Lets go."

Throughout the years, Sakura had developed into a beautiful, seventeen and a half year old young lady. She had kept her silky hair short, the ends brushing her shoulders lightly as she ran. She had been training with Lady Tsunade since she was twelve…when Sasuke had finally ran away, not a month after Naruto had been supposedly killed by the Akatsuki. She closed her eyes to hold back her tears, remembering that god-awful, almost suicidal, part of her life. The only way she had brought herself out of it was training like crazy, trying to make her physical pain outweigh her mental pain. Along with learning extreme chakra control like her mentor, she had learned the best medical nin jutsu and was now only second to Tsunade herself. She had finally been redeployed as Kakashi's pupil to help search down criminals…and Orochimaru and Sasuke were close to the top of the list. Surprisingly, Sakura had volunteered to look for them, and Kakashi had agreed to come along for an equally strong second hand. They were on their way to their base from a new lead when this had suddenly happened.

Breaking herself out of her thoughts, she looked up from her slim, fast moving legs to the whizzing leaves of the forest. She was determined to bring Sasuke back…no matter what it took.

She had already lost Naruto and like HELL was she going to lose Sasuke.

X - X - X

Not far away that person, who Sakura had been thinking about, groaned in agony as his body tried to adjust to absorbing Orochimaru's chakra. He had known Orochimaru's power was warped in darkness, but it was hard for him to manage all this evil in his body while trying to keep his own sanity. He had already guessed that Orochimaru was trying to take over his body as he was weakened from his battle with Naruto, but he knew that he could still overcome the snake sanin. He had too much to live for already. Not only did he have to still kill Itachi, he now had to kill Naruto too.

To him, ever second felt like a year of agony as he tried to expel the darkness. He barely had enough strength to lean over to puke globs of black, himself not _wanting_ to know what it was.

Finally, as the stinging started to fade, himself not knowing if it was really going away or if it was his sword's poison finally fully kicking in, he felt the first taste of freedom from Orochimaru. He had absorbed his raw power, but not his state of mind and desires. He closed his eyes in relief.

Right when he was about to drift off into his coma sleep, hoping his aura would scare away any animals that would come to eat him, he felt something land on either side of him.

Opening his eyes, he found that everything was one giant blur of blue from the sky and green from the trees. As he was about to close his eyes again from lack of energy, pink filled his blurred vision as well as two sparkling gems of green.

He could faintly hear two voices yelling at each other, but then everything went entirely black.

X - X - X

Naruto didn't know when it had started, but he suddenly felt like he was drifting in and out of his body. He'd be running through the forest and he'd get ready to land on a branch when he'd suddenly black out and he'd be falling through the air. Thankfully he'd be high enough so that when he came back to consciousness from the whizzing air in his face he was able to sloppily land on another, lower branch before he crashed to the ground.

After this had happened four times, Naruto had stopped and had jumped down to the forest floor, actually tripping as he landed and so had fallen on top of the knee high grass. He struggled to sit off, ripping his jacket and shirt off to take a closer look at his Sasuke inflicted wound. Groaning in partial annoyance and anger, he looked down to find that the wound was foaming. Blood was still gushing out, but around the edges there was a bluish-green like foam. Bending down, he sniffed the wound and cursed as he smelt a hint of poison, now knowing why his body was acting the way it was. He guessed that the foam around the edges was his advanced body trying to repel the poison.

Having no energy left, he finally laid down on his back, clasping his large hands over the wound sloppily to try and stop the bleeding. Feeling the warm liquid on his hands as it went through his fingers, he closed his eyes. Opening them a few seconds later, he looked up to the blue sky and tree canopy, finding a few birds flying overhead.

He watched in a daze as a feather from one start to float down, getting closer and closer to his down form. Finally, it landed on the tip of his nose, balancing on him for a second before a gust of wind took it to some other unknown place, Naruto not having enough energy to turn his head to watch it float away.

He sneered as he suddenly thought of how boring he was being right now. Laying in a random part in a random forest watching some random feather when he should have already been back to Pain's lair. He moved one of his blood-covered hands to rub against his pinkie finger, yearning for that ring to be there. If he'd been at the base then Pain would have already given him the permission to wear it…he would have been a full member already, no doubt given a cool assignment...

"Heh, I bet you're laughing at me right now, aren't you Kyuubi?" He muttered out darkly, "My first mission and I can't do anything right. Probably would have helped if I hadn't acted like a complete ass and sealed you away...you didn't deserve that." He closed his eyes for a second as the bright sunlight was getting to him. He was now slightly panted, feeling as if his lungs were starting to close up.

"Now not only am I going to be late, I don't even know what's up with this gnarly wound. Will it kill me...? I don't want to die..." He started to drift off as his eyelids started to fall over his eyes in a haphazard way.

"I'm to young...to die..." He finally closed his eyes and let the darkness fall over him.

X - X - X

Sakura was scarred out of her wits. Sasuke was fading fast and she had no idea what to do. She had guessed from his stomach wound that he had been stabbed with the sword that laid not far off, Kakashi having pulled it out when they'd first arrived, but she didn't know why it was affecting him so much. She remembered his glassy eyes that she'd been staring into not thirty seconds ago before he'd closed them, yet to open them again.

She knew the pain must be overwhelming, but that was really no reason for Sasuke's body to start shutting down to the extreme that it was. It just didn't make _sense_!

"I wonder who did this." Sakura heard her mentor mutter as he expected Orochimaru's corpse, knowing he couldn't do anymore for Sasuke as Sakura could.

"Anyway, he's long dead and I doubt that this sannin is going to come back to life." Kakashi further said as he finally turned his one visible eye back to the teenage pair on the ground.

"Kakashi-sensei, please help me." Sakura pleaded as tears started to blur her vision. All those years of training and she was still the spineless, weak kunoichi that no one would acknowledge.

"Ok, first off, you need to relax. Let me come and smell." Kakashi tried to comfort as he kneeled down on Sasuke's other side, making sure to not touch a black puddle of god-knows-what, and craned his head towards the wound, sniffing it a few times.

He stood up again, Sakura rising with him, as he put a hand to his chin in thought.

"Do you smell anything Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura choked out, failing to stop her tears from further gathering.

"There's no question that he's been poisoned with that sword. It's almost entirely odorless and I'm sure I can only smell it now because it's been activated and mixed with blood."

"Is there anything we can do? I can't identify the poison at all even though I've memorized every single one and their cures from Tsunade's medical books!" Sakura cried, not being able to hold in her tears as they overflowerd her green eyes and cascaded down her thin face.

"I'm sorry Sakura…but that's how it is. I'm very sorry." Kakashi said as he stepped towards here to put a hand on her shoulder.

Sakura, hiding her face in her healing hands, looked up at her kind faced teacher, feeling a new wave of utter defeat. Out of upure desperation, she launched herself to him, hugging the silver haired man tightly around the chest as if she was scared he was going to leave her too.

"Now, now Sakura. It's all right. Everything happens for a reason." Kakashi tried to consol as he cautiously wrapped his arms around her too, still a little flustered at the intimate gesture.

"You just cry it out." He whispered as he buried his nose in her hair, liking the smell of faint strawberries much better then poison and Sasuke's blood.

"Sensei…" Sakura wailed out for the entire forest to hear.

A few trees away, a small group of deer watched with blinking brown eyes and flicking ears before prancing off, knowing with their intuition not to stay.

Kakashi snapped his eye open just in time to catch a glimpse of the buck as it dove into the bushes. But the Jounin shook it off as he tightened his grip on his student.

Sometimes he truly wondered what the point of being a shinobi was.

X - X - X

"Ah…so that is what is happening. Then call all members and order them to report to here immediately. With this sudden alliance action of all those fucking countries, we need to regroup before any other actions." Pein thoughtfully said to Zetsu who stood in front of him.

"Should I go inform Naruto of this order too?" Zetsu said as he looked away from his leader's piercing eyes.

"No…let him do what he has to do. The meeting place is here anyway and that's where he's headed right now. Let him survive on his own."

"Aw…but what happens if he dies? Who will I get to check out?" Konan said with a straight face, making Pein furrow his eyebrows in annoyance.

"Konan…" Pein said through clenched teeth.

"Yes Pein?" She asked with a straight face again as she avoided eye contact, taking her paper hair ornament out of her shocking blue hair to tweak with thin fingers.

Pein was silent for a second, trying to make Konan look up into his glaring face, but finally settled to glare at Zetsu who was still awkwardly standing there, not having been dismissed yet.

"You may leave." Pein said with a wave of his hand, the two souled member fleeing the room immediately, the white glad at the escape while the black wished to stay and see how things evolved between the sour pair.

"What a _shit load_ of problems this has become…damn nations. Why don't they just roll over and DIE! It's inevitable that we're going to rule them one day." Pein informed as he laid down on his bed, putting his calloused hands over his ringed eyes.

"You know…I have an idea that could cheer you up." Konan purred as she climbed over Pein's body, hovering over him as her warm breath tickled his neck to whisper the proposal.

"Sounds nice."

X - X - X

"Do any of you have any idea why I've called you all here?" Tsunade asked as she starred out from behind her desk to the three Jounins.

"Not exactly m'lady...and not to sound rude, but will you please make it quick as I was just about to go see Lee. He just got back from a mission ya know! I'm SO PROUD!" Gai exclaimed as he held in tears of ecstasy.

"Yeah...anyway, what's this all about?" Asuma drawlded out as his cigarette's smoke played on his lips before melting back into the air.

"Yes, I'm also very curious for this odd meeting." The genjutsu master Kurenai asked while waving her hand to try and rid herself of the smoke from Asuma's cigarette that always seemed to engulf her.

Tsunade was quiet for a moment as she rested her face behind her intertwined fingers before she opened her piercing hazel eyes, making the three in front of her slightly tense.

"I know that this is really unnecessary, but I would like to ask your permission to use your former teams for an S rank mission of the utmost importance." Tsunade said calmly, although inside she was jittery with the statement.

"Has something happened?" Kurenai exclaimed as she took a step forward.

"It is nothing to panic about Kurenai."

"If it's '_nothing to panic about_' why are you calling our past teams to do such a dangerous mission?!"

"Kurenai!" Asuma snapped as he laid a hand on her small shoulder, bringing her a step back. She stayed still, yet her red eyes gleamed with irritation and confusion before finally settling on her shoes, clenched fists at her sides.

"I'm sure you don't know this information, as it's top secret...but I'm going to tell you this because you three are reliable shinobi who I know I can trust from personal past experiences." Tsunade said before she closed her eyes and leaned back, intertwining her fingers now in her lap as she tried to think of how to word this as best as possible.

"We have recently had an extremely productive treaty of alliance sighed with almost every hidden village around. It's not constricting in only that we all agreed to try our hardest to catch the Akatsuki before they become an even bigger threat then they already are. All the members of the Akatsuki have congregated into one hidden, top secret place since news of this treaty has leaked and we need to find where that hideout is. If we can find them right now, when they're all gathered together, we may have a chance of eradicating them once and for all."

The Hokage opened her eyes to look at the three stunned faces.

"This was given to me by a slightly shaky lead, but none the less, if this is the truth we can't afford to let this up. I want to have your teams because they are, by far, the star youths of this village as of now. Each has a unique trait that can be very helpful to fight against these top ranking villains. I ask your permission for the use of your past students because I know that each of you value all of these teenagers with a big heart and you must know that if they DO go on this mission, it's very possible that they might die. But also know that this is for not only the betterment of this village, but for the _entire_ shinobi world."

There was silence for a few minutes before Asuma broke it with a loud sigh before throwing his cigarette butt down on the floor and putting it out with his foot.

"After a speech like that...how can I say no?" He said with a sigh.

"I am confident about my team's abilities...they will fight with the _fire of youth!!_" Gai explained as he pumped his fist in the air, smiling as to prevent himself from crying.

"I..." Kurenai dawdled off, not knowing what to say.

"They'll be ok. Especially with Hinata and her Byakugan and Kiba with his recklessness that he can always back up. Then Shino is always clear headed and can clean everything up." Asuma assured as grabbed her around her thin waist and drew her closer to him.

"Alright." She sighed, resisting the urge to smile like a schoolgirl at the way Asuma was holding her in public, even if it was only a two person audience.

"Well...now that that's taken care of, Gai and Asuma you are dissmissed. Kurenai, I'd like a quick word." Tsunade said with a gentle smile on her seemingly young face.

Gai strutted out while Asume held Kurenai for a second more before planting a soft kiss on the top of her head before disappearing too.

With the click of the grand doors, it was silent as the two kunoichi starred at each other, or more like Kurenai starred at her shoes while Tsunade inspected her. The beautiful genjutsu expert knew she had been a little rude...but she didn't deserve to be punished for it! But what Tsunade said next dissipated all those thoughts in a split second.

"You're pregnant." Tsunade said seriously, causing Kurenai to snap her head up with a deep blush.

"H-How did you know?" She asked as she place her hands on her still flat stomach, having just found out herself two days ago.

"I'm a medic nin, what do you expect? Well, know that this changes things. I was planning on having both you and Asuma go with your teams...but that's impossible now. Gai will go, but you other two will stay here."

"No! Asuma doesn't know...at least let him go. He WANTS to!" Kurenai pleaded, her arms moving to hug herself.

"It's already decided. You and him will be staying here, and no arguing or pleading will change that. You may go now." Tsunade said before she waved her hand to motion the last command and twisting in her chair to stare out the large open windows.

"Damn." Kurenai swore under her breath as she left out the doors, feeling as if this sudden gift of a baby had become a curse.

X - X - X

"Kakashi-sensei..."

"Don't say it. It's _not_ your fault."

Sakura bit her tongue after Kakashi's command, surprised at how he knew she was going to say really before it solidified in her developed brain.

"But...I just have to say it. _I'm sorry_." She blurted out suddenly as she stopped on a tree branch. Yet this time tears didn't form. She'd used them all up in her tight embrace with Kakashi.

"Sakura..." Kakashi sighed, finding that when he looked into her eyes he found the same innocence he'd seen at their first meeting. Yet when he blinked, he finally noticed how much of a woman she had become. She had really grown up.

"No one is blaming you for anything."

"But...I was so _useless_...if I could have identified the poison, if I could have cured him..."

Kakashi wished he could put a hand on her shoulder in comfort like before, but knew that his hands were being used right now.

"And it doesn't really help that I have to carry him all the way BACK!" Sakura snarled, surprising Kakashi in how quickly her mood swung.

"It's custom for top criminals to be taken back to the village were they were wanted. Just to make precautions and do an autopsy to see if there's any secrets still left in the body. I wonder why the other person who did the killings didn't do it, but it doesn't matter anymore. I thought Tsunade would have taught you that." Kakashi said as he leaped off the branch, hoping Sakura would follow so they'd get to the Leaf Village as soon as possible. He'd MUCH rather carry Sasuke, in his opinion, then a decapitated snake sanin that had killed the Third and countless others.

Sakura chose not to answer as she looked down at Sasuke's pale hands that hung over her shoulders, thinking in despair of how she'd longed to hold his hand. As a couple.

"I knew that..." She whispered the lie as she took off too, focusing her brilliantly beautiful green eyes to the forest in front of her and not his hands.

Kakashi looked back at his student, knowing what was going through her head and heart all too well from his own deceased team and wishing that she could have been spared.

X - X - X

"So why have you called us all here?" Shikamaru drawled out as he stuffed his hands in his pockets.

"Yes, I'd like to know as I was just in the middle of shopping and It'd just found this AMAZING dress and I was going to-" Ino's puffy ramble was cut of as one of Shikamaru's hands moved from his pocket to her mouth, making her cheeks turn the slightest bit pink at the innocent contact.

"I might as well get down to business since all of you are here." Tsunade said as she looked out at the three former team collected youths of Shikamaru, Ino, Chouji, Lee, Neji, TenTen, Kiba, Shino, and Hinata. They were each from the ages of sixteen and a half to nineteen, both Hyugas being both the youngest and oldest.

Tsunade sighed as she leaned back in her not-as-comfortable-chair-as-she'd-like before closing and opening her demanding hazel eyes to look at each of the youths dead in the eye, not getting much reaction except for when Hinata blushed lightly and side stepped a few inches closer to Kiba.

"What I am about to tell you is TOP SECRET. If this leaks out...I don't even want to know the dire consequences."

At this harsh statement, almost all the youths tensed, Shikamaru the only one who was still lax as he took a cigarette from behind his ear and easily lit it with his plain metal lighter, the soft click of ignition sounding loud in the drop dead silence of the room.

"Now...this is about the Akatsuki." Tsunade started her long speech about the overall history of the organization, it's known members (including their discription in both physical and shinobi ways), and, the most important part, in how they were supposedly all collected in the same area. She finished her long, but very educational lecture, before gazing up into the nine different faces.

"So you want us to go after them?" Neji said with a twitch of his lavender eyes outside as a few birds flew by.

"Precisely." Tsunade said with a curt nod of her head, her low pigtails swinging with the stiff motion.

"But why _us_? I mean...no offense guys, but we're not exactly the best shinobi or kunoichi of the village. Plus we're fairly young and we don't have much experience in something as huge as this." TenTen smartly added, grinning on the inside as Neji nodded his head once at her wise words.

"YOU may think that, but you are all outstanding shinobi and kunoichi that are the cream of the crop right now. I'm sending you for all of your good qualities that will intermingle and then hopefully be able to defeat the ten, or so, criminal members. Your diversity will be their downfall." Tsunade said with pride, hoping that at least a little of it would get through to the stubborn teenagers.

"You are almost all Jounin, and that's amazing as that. Now, no more arguments. Nara Shikamaru will be your leader as he has the most experience. You will despatch tomorrow at the gate, 0530 hours and don't be late!" Tsunade snapped, tardiness being one of her major pet peeves.

The three teams nodded their heads before leaving the office and then continuing down the hallway and out of the exquisite building.

"So...seems like the world was just put on our shoulders." Kiba sighed as they all gathered in a circle not far away from the building, knowing they still had other things to discuss before tomorrow rather then the meeting time. Akamaru whined as he nudged Hinata's arm, begging him to pet him. The young Hyuga couldn't hide her shy smile as she tentively started to stroke the large white dogs spikey, yet soft, fur.

"I agree, but this is a great time to show what we got." TenTen said with a smirk, absently twirling a kunai on her index finger, making Chouji a little nervous as he stood next to her.

"YOSH!" Lee added as he pumped a fist in the air while jumping in glee at this golden opportunity to show how he was just as ingenious as Neji and anyone else.

"Is there anything else we need to really talk about rather then bring the essentials, since I feel this is going to be a long term mission. But pack light since it's in the Land of Stone and that's a while away." Neji said as he crossed his arms, his hands disappearing into the sleeves of his white kimono like outfit.

The others nodded their heads, knowing that they had lots to do, and it being four in the afternoon already, they needed every minute left of the day.

Everyone went their own ways, leaving Ino and Shikamaru starring across at each other. Shikamaru simply shrugged his shoulders, turning around to start walking home, knowing his Mom would have a hissy fit if he didn't tell he what was going asap. Ino sighed as she followed, knowing that her house was very close to his and so they naturally had the same route home.

Ino looked down at her high heeled shinobi boots as she walked, Shikamaru's half opened eyes moving from the end of his burning cigarette to her pretty face before finally landing on the skies above him, finding that the late afternoon light was just starting to color the clouds with various colors.

"You'll do fine." He suddenly blurted, not only surprising himself but also Ino.

"What're you talking about?" Ino laughed nervously, playing with her short shirt that did nothing to hid her flat stomach. Shikamaru sighed, knowing that he had just entered into dangerous waters.

"You're worried about being up to par with everyone since you're the only Chūnin, even though you could be a Jonin if you wanted." He said as he stretched his thin arms above his spiky head, yawning as he did so but making sure that his prized roll of tobacco didn't drop from his wide open mouth.

Ino was silent as they walked, the only sound being the crunch of dirt beneith their sandals. It was silent all the way to Shikamaru's house, where he walked up the few steps before opening the door, intending to go in, before Ino stopped him.

"So _what_ if I'm scarred?" Ino fumed up suddenly, her face graced pink again, yet this time from anger.

Shikamaru sighed, thinking of how troublesome women could be sometimes.

"What do you want me to say?" He stated bluntly as he puffed out a smoke ring, making Ino scrunch her nose in disgust. She never did like it when Asuma smoked, and now _HE_ was doing it too.

With a huff, she walked up to him and yanked the cigarette from his mouth before using her high heel to ground it into the welcome mat of his house.

"Invite me to watch the clouds, like I know you do everyday at this time." She said with her head held high before strutting in.

Shikamaru sighed, but couldn't help but let a ghost of a smile come across his face as he followed her to his lanai outside his room where clouds of all colors waited to be seen.

"What a drag."

X - X - X

Naruto groaned as sunlight suddenly filtered into his breathtaking blue eyes, only to be blinded. He was about to cover his eyes to block out the inferring sunlight, but found that he couldn't move his arm.

In a second, it all came flooding back.

The battle. The sword. The Uchiha.

Growling weakly, he rapidly blinked as to try and adjust to the overwhelming sunlight. Not being able to move his body, he cursed as he also noted he couldn't feel any part from his neck down and he could barely open his mouth to breath, knowing he still couldn't talk as it'd take too much precious oxygen.

Closing his eyes, he thought of how a suppose to be smooth and perfectly thought out mission, this once-in-a-life time opportunity, had gone downhill because of his carelessness.

Cursing, he told himself that once he got full control over his body again he was going to set everything right no matter what it took because he was NOT a failure.

* * *

Glossary/Notes:

0530 - military time for 5:30 AM

Ages of everyone (just for clarification, and yes they're tweaked a -little- bit):

Kiba - 17½

Shino - 17

Hinata - 16½

Chouji - 17½

Ino - 17

Shikamaru - 17½

TenTen - 18

Neji - 19

Lee - 18½

Naruto - 17

Sasuke - 18

Sakura - 17½

Kakashi - 31

And NO Konan is _NOT_ a slut...she's just likes to make Pein jealous with Naruto. Ye-eah...


	3. Shadow of the Day

**Chapter 3 : Shadow of the Day**

_Sometimes solutions aren't so simple,  
Sometimes goodbye's the only way.  
And the shadow of the day will embrace the world in grey,  
And the sun will set...  
And the sun will set for you._

* * *

"Do you smell any of them Kiba?" Hinata asked softly as she crouched down to her friend who was currently on all fours. His nose was practically touching the ground as he took deep whiffs, trusty Akamaru doing the same next to him. Hinata was glad that Tsunade allowed him to sniff a several straw hats and scraps of cloth at the short briefing at the town gates before they went out on the mission so that he knew at least some of their scents. She also held down a smile as she was once again reminded of how much Kiba was like a dog, this having always oddly comforted her rather then be appalled like most girls might.

"No, but I _DO_ smell poisoned human blood around a couple hundred miles away from here that's maybe two...four days old." He stated as he looked up at Shino and Hinata, breaking the dark haired beaut out her reflective thoughts. She slightly jumped as she heard Akamaru bark a little too loudly in agreement with his master.

Two days ago, when the entire nine of them had meet at the gate, Neji had been the one to suggest that they break up into their original teams so that they could cover more ground. Although they knew that the lead had narrowed it down to only the Rock Country, it was still one of the largest countries in land mass as it went deep into the mountains. The other eight had agreed as it seemed like the most logical way of dealing with things, even if they did lose the aspect of safety in numbers to an extent. They had decided to meet up again in a four days, and so two more days, on the outskirts of a town in the middlish area of the country, so that they could report to each other as to what they had or hadn't found. Team 8 had been assigned to go straight through the middle, while the other two teams went to the left and right. They hadn't been having any luck in picking up any clues to track, even though it was their speciality, until now. Kiba had just stoppped the trio and declared that he smelt the faintest whiff of something that didn't exactly belong in the deep woods.

"We should follow it. May have been a fight that could give us some clues." Shino said through his high collar as he adjusted his dark glasses that hid equally dark eyes.

"It should only take a day and a half to get there if we only rest once for four hours." Hinata quickly calculated as Kiba got up from his down position, dusting his slightly clawed hands on his black pants.

"Then what're we waiting for?" The dog nin asked with a feral smirk towards Hinata, his long and sharp canines brushing his bottom lip, before he was off with a spin.

Hinata sighed as she watched Kiba go into the forest with her pupil-less lavender eyes before she too rose from her crouch and followed in pursuit with Shino.

X - X - X

Years of experience kept Naruto from moving or opening his eyes when he woke. Always check if the area is secure before letting anybody know you were awake was one of the first rules he'd ever learned when he'd first joined, even though the action was at the bottom of his things he liked to follow. The first thing he sensed was how a soft wind kept caressing his face and going through his long hair, then how there were birds cheerily chirping like there wasn't one evil thing in the world as the sun warmed his wounded body. He stayed still for at least a half hour as he kept discretely sniffing the air for signs of a person and straining his ears to find anything other then sparrow song. Finally, he groaned as he tried to roll over in his down position before groggily opening his eyes. He starred out to find numerous green shoots of grass that hid his body, the stalks stretching into the deep blue sky that had a few clouds passing by. He sat up and noticed with a groan that at place where he'd been stabbed, the blood was now old and dried, cracking with his movement.

Stretching his head as close as he could get to the wound, he smelled it, the almost rotting scent making him rear his head back with a grimace. He took his fingers and started rubbing away the old blood, finding that the wound had still yet to heal up completely. In addition to it still not fully closed, the stab from the poisoned encoded katana had an outring of some greenish substense. When Naruto took a finger and flicked some off to smell in closer inspection, he blanched and found that the gross scent wasn't coming from him but from this.

Sighing as he rolled his eyes, he lied back down into the tall grass. Blinking as the midday sun hit his crysal blue eyes, he remembered that the grass wasn't as tall as it was now when he had blacked out, this fact making him wonder just how long he'd been asleep for. Not being able to take the hot sun in his eyes anymore, he sat up in Indian style and placed his hands on his slightly propped up knees, getting in a comfortable position to meditate. He closed his eyes slowly as he tried to empty his mind and think back to what had recently happened in his life.

Usually his memory was extrememly sharp and he could remember the finest detail, so it was no doubt that the unknown poision had not only affected his physical being but also his mental, making his memory ever since he'd gotten stabbed and ran away one big blur. His closed eyes twitched as he tried to focus with more zeal…

Running…falling…sun in the eyes...contemplating death...

Blinking his eyes open again, he was actually glad that the poison hadn't killed him. He had thought about how he'd die a few times when he had thought he'd been stabbed beyond healing back up by Hidan, it being very similar to how he felt before he had fallen asleep from the poison except in a more drugged and heavy way. He had decided a while back that if he had to go, it'd be in a big boom, something that people would see for miles and remember for centuries. Something that would be concidered an act of an angry god, an immortal action. Thinking of how lame it would have been if he'd died from a sword stab from one of his former teammates in a forest where his body would probably rot away without being found, he allowed another breath of relief and thanked his fast metablizing body yet again.

But as he breathed in deeply again, he caught the scent of the unappetizing poison, causing him to gag again and deciding it needed to go - _now_. Getting up and stretching his hands over his head, arching his back in a satisfying way, he sniffed the air again and opened his ears more in search of a river. It only took a few seconds before he detected one not very far off, and one running at a moderate level just right for washing. First starting out with walking, his hip bone area still sore, he pushed himself after a few paces into a jog and then into full out running and then leaping through the tree branches, finding that if he kept the wound moving it didn't seem to keep that dull throb.

X - X - X

"I can't believe this." Tsunade breathed as she looked down at the two bodies that laid before her, one with a head and the other without.

"You are both _IDIOTS_!" The Fifth Hokage snarled as she turned around to glare at two of her best shinobi group in the village, her exclamation not only shocking the duo but Tsunade for having to say it.

"Kakashi, did you even bother to _examine_ the bodies?" Tsunade grit out between her straight white teeth that were currently being ground together as she held down the urge to punch a hole in the nearest wall.

"Excuse me?" Kakashi asked as his visible eye blinked. He didn't want to admit it, but it seemed unnecessary as he'd seen Sasuke die right before their eyes and with Orochimaru not having a head...well, self explanatory at it's finest.

"Do it now." Tsunade snapped as she pointed a dangerous finger towards Sasuke's body.

As the copy nin leaned down, Sakura chewed her plump bottom lip in aggravation. She really didn't see anything that they'd done wrong. After two days of constant travel, they'd finally arrived back at Kohona. They'd immediately taken the bodies of the two rouge shinobi to the Hokage building so that Tsunade could see it with her own eyes like they'd know she'd want to do. Yet when they'd laid the bodies on a brought out table, and Tsunade had starred at them for a few minutes in silence, she had then yelled at them, and was now intently glaring at the equally pretty Sakura across of her while Kakashi leaned down with an ear to Sasuke's chest.

"I…don't understand Sensei." Sakura voiced her current thoughts, fumbling with her fingers that she hid behind her back as she stood straight.

"No way…" Kakashi's whisper interrupted anything that Tsunade was about to snap back at her five year prodigy student.

"I'm glad to see that you notice it _NOW_, Mr. Excellent Shinobi." Tsunade said as her eyes focused with Kakashi's wide one.

Hazel eyes moving from black to green, Sakura forced down a shiver. Although she was considered a (strong) woman in her shinobi status who shouldn't be afraid of anything, whenever her mentor gave her a glare of such scale it still made the hairs on her neck prickle. It was as if she could already feel the broken rips and punctured organs. But the blond didn't open her mouth or raise her fist to express her clear displeasure this time, but instead simply waved her hand towards Sasuke's body.

"Tsunade…" Sakura choked down, not wanting to get close to her deceased teammate. Hadn't it been enough that she had to carry him all the way back?

"It's alright Sakura." Kakashi encouraged as he put a gloved hand on her thin shoulder, making the pink haired teen sigh before taking a small step towards the body of her long time crush. The one who she had worked so hard for...the one she would have given her life for...

Holding down a whimper, she did what she had been taught to do when checking if someone was alive or not, and that was placing a hand near the mouth to see if they were still breathing and an ear to their heart to see if it was still pounding.

Sakura bit her swollen lip again as she knew she wasn't going to feel something. Yet she stayed for longer then necessary…she still didn't grasp that he had died. His peaceful face was still too much for her to take. And then it happened.

The faintest heartbeat reverberated.

The slightest exhaled breath passed through her slim fingers she knew she wouldn't have felt if she hadn't been waiting for it so expectantly.

So shocked from the sudden noise that seemed to vibrate in her ear and barely warm breath that tickled her hand, Sakura jumped back and almost fell, if it was not for Kakashi who caught her by the arms.

"It's…not…" Sakura tried to say but found that words refused to form.

"Yes." Tsunade affirmed as she placed a hand over his stomach to heal the wound from his sword, first taking out the tinted green poison to place in a nearby bowl.

"He's alive." Kakashi finally voiced out.

Sakura couldn't say anything as she slowly pushed away from Kakashi to take Sasuke's cold hand in her own smaller, warm one.

"It's a miracle…"

X - X - X

With his wound, Naruto's running was seriously impaired and this only added to his list of annoyances. Not that it took an extra two minutes to get to the river, but the fact that it would take longer to get to Pein's base in the mountains.

When he did finally arrive at the river, Naruto put a hand to his wound to find that it had reopened with his running. Now slightly limping as to not agrivate it anymore, he started to hop on one leg along the large river rocks worn by water over hundreds of years until he found a nice collective pool that was of moderate size. Not thinking twice, he stripped out off all his clothes. First, he washed those since he didn't want to smell old blood for longer then neccessary and then grabbed a few sticks nearby to hang them to dry. When that chore was done, he finally jumped fully into the crystal clear pool and resurfaced with a gasp. Getting to work right away, he started scrubbing the dried blood that he hadn't gotten off yet, using his claws to try and dig out any poison that was still in the open wound. When he felt like he was about finished, he got out of the water and sniffed his wound again, finding that almost all traces of old gore and poison had left. He lifted his head again to smell the fresh air in clear his nose, but he suddenly picked something up that wasn't usually found in this kind of remote forest.

Another shinobi.

As his body tensed, he knew he only had time to make a grab for his clothes before they were upon him. So, lunging for his pants and coat, and so gang ring, he dived back into the pond to create no splash, going to the side where there was a small indention and he knew that he could hide from view and the water would wash away his scent, especially since he'd just bathed.

It didn't take ten seconds when he'd gotten into his position before he heard someone land just above him with a light thump on the rocks.

Growling in amusement, he knew that he could easily take one person and was just about to leap out, since he'd managed to get his pants on, but was stopped when he heard another thump, this one louder as signaling that it weighed more then the first. As his eyebrows furrowed, two more thumps could he heard and this caused him to surpress a groan at his bad luck.

"Is it the smell?" An obviously male voice asked, the voice causing the hair on his neck to rise which made Naruto want to growl all the more. This hair standing reaction wasn't one of fear, but it was as if...he didn't even know.

"Wait. It's here, but..." A different male voice said as Naruto couldn't keep it in anymore. He had to get out of this cold water and stop acting like a coward. As he thought this, he grabbed the ring from the pocket in his jacket and jammed it onto his pinkie finger, not caring if he had permission from Pein or not. Right now, he didn't want to lose the one thing that had actually gone fine and without incident for him. Taking his other hand away to expect the sight, he found that the ring was almost a little bit too loose only to find in the next second it tightening to fit his finger comfortably. But his eyes were torn from the ring to the face of a big white dog the size of a bear as it bared it's teeth at him from the opposite side of the bank, it having a clear sight of him.

Now not having a choice, he dropped his useless cloak into the fast moving water and jumped out from the pool, showering the three people with the cold river water as he flew over and then behind them. But in midair, one of the three had jumped up too and grabbed Naruto's ankle, causing him to plummet back to the ground with a sickening crack as his head hit stone.

Blinking to try and get ride of the fogginess, the blond found himself starring into the smirking face of Kiba.

"Don't touch me." Naruto growled out as he flipped up, consequently hitting Kiba square in the jaw with his foot and causing the feral face of Kiba to contort into an expression of pain.

Feeling his pent up anger start to resurface, he sprung forward and tackled Kiba into the a boulder, causing the older teen to cough up a little blood as he'd no doubt now had a few broken ribs.

"Were you attempting to _tickle me_ when you hit me against that stone? Because it didn't work." Naruto asked as he flipped back a good twenty feet to give Kiba and the other two space. As he landed, he saw that the other two personas were that of Shino and Hinata, making him snort. How predictable.

"Kiba!" Hinata cried in worry as she appeared at his side, placing glowing hands over his chest to heal his broken insides.

"Y-You should save your chakra for yourself." Kiba stuttered, although couldn't stop her as her healing touch felt too good.

"Please stop. You're going to make me puke." Naruto scoffed as he noted that Shino had started to gather bugs around him in preparation for a swarm.

As Hinata turned from Kiba's tattooed face to look at Naruto's whiskered ones, her lavender eyes widening before starting to tear up.

"Hinata...?" Kiba asked as he looked up from his healed chest to Hinata's distressed face, her first tear falling. His slanted black eyes moved from her face to Naruto's as his eyes too widened, before narrowing and he started growling and baring his fangs. Naruto's eyes focused back from Shinto to on the pair and growled right back as he curled his lip back in retort.

"How _DARE_ you impersonate Naruto!" Kiba asked as he stood, pushing a still shocked Hinata behind him. It seemed that seeing his face after years of not had utterly shocked her to the point where her legs couldn't hold her.

"Who says I'm impersonating?" Naruto sneered as his snarl turned into a smirk.

"Why do you look like Naruto?" Shino finally voiced in a hush, Naruto now openly wincing as he watched bugs crawl out of his jacket collar to crawl around the small visible part of his face.

"God, you guys are SLOW." Naruto scoffed as he took his hands off his bare hips to crack his knuckles. He was going to have at least a _little_ fun with the two, and three when Hinata decided to get off her ass.

"You CAN'T be Naruto. The Naruto _I know_ would _never_ become an Akatsuki member." Kiba snarled out, letting his mind reflect back to his fight with the blond all those years back during the Chūnin Exams.

"Ask your stupid dog." Naruto said, as he allowed his left hand to feel over his wound to see if it was still bleeding, finding that it thankfully wasn't, or at least not yet. He surpressed his growing annoyance as he knew this would confide his sporatic fighting to at least a little. He usually wouldn't pay so much heed to a wound but if it was right by his hip which was essential to running, which is what he needed to do to get to the base in as little time as possible, he might want to pay attention as to not antagonize it further.

Kiba gave one final growl before he leaned down, Akamaru leaning his muzzle closer to his master's ear to whimper something to him.

"See?"

"You _are_ Naruto." Kiba said in astonishment as his black eyes widened, Shino's own widening too although it was hidden by his glasses.

"What happened to you Naruto?" Hinata whispered as she felt her heart break. "What have they done to you?" She continued as she leaned on Kiba for support, who in response wrapped a hand over her thin waist to further support her.

"I _wanted_ this wench." Naruto spat as he gave her an icy glare that made the tears in her eyes finally start to really cascade down her pretty pale face.

"Animal." Kiba growled feeling his anger rise at the sight of a falling apart Hinata.

"_You're_ one to talk."

But Naruto's snap only ruffled Kiba's fur more and, finally having taken enough, lunged out at the blond with his own claws. Naruto easily dodged, only to be advanced on again by Shino. Tsking, he couldn't dogde in the air before the bugs were suddenly upon him, covering every inch of his body.

But Naruto didn't panic, only grin widely as he started to heat up his body temperature. After the second time he'd morphed more with Kyuubi, he'd found that he could successfully change the body temperature without using any intentional chakra output, it was as simple as blinking his eye. The only problem was that if he kept it too hot he started cooking from the inside out and that if he made himself too cold, those same organs would start to shut down and his musceles would freeze and crack. But for this task of getting ride of bugs, he only had to elevate his skin so that they soon started bursting into instant combustion.

Not feeling the fire on his skin since it was hotter then it, he continued his fall and when he landed, bolted across for Shino, deciding to get ride of him first by grabbing him around the neck. Relinquishing in the feel of him struggling for breath, Naruto had to crinkle his nose as to try and prevent the burning scent of Shino's neck from his overheated skin from getting in.

"SHINO!" Kiba bellowed before he barked at Akamaru and they swiftly did their Fang Over Fang that had been perfected and strenghtened over many years of harsh practices. Naruto glanced with bored eye at the attack and sighed before jumping up at the last second, relinquishing Shino from his strangle.

"_Oh_...three more seconds and I'd have suffocated him...or burned his head clear off." Naruto said with a shrug of his boney shoulders as he watched Kiba crouch down to his teammate that was having a hard time breathing since his neck was now burned to an extreme.

"Did he _really_ think that those bugs could affect me?!" Naruto laughed out bitterly as he grabbed one of his bugs that still hovered weakly in the air between his thumb and index finger, easily squishing it before it started burning from his heat.

"Kiba! Is he alright?!" Hinata said in a paniced rush as she approached Kiba's side, seeming to have finally gotten a hold of herself, using her healing justus again to heal Shino's wounded neck which was almost burned beyond repair. Even as she healed it up, there would still be a scar that would never heal.

"Urgh, with you healing everyone this is going to take some time." Naruto sighed as he ran a hand through his long blond locks, grimacing at the pretty Hyuuga before looking up at the sky, finding it to now be at least two with the position of the sun. Damn it, time was running out. Even if he ran at his fastest pace-

"Pay attention demon!" Kiba barked out just as he decended on Naruto in his transformed two headed, massive dog with Akamaru. Naruto had been so caught up in his thoughts that he hadn't noticed the transformation, and was now lightly amused at the sight.

"Interesting." Naruto laughed as he started a number of hand signs in a flash, designed to create fire in the form of a dragon to bloom from his mouth to burn the two headed dog away, but found that when he ended, nothing but smoke formed out of his fanged mouth. Biting his lip in frustration, causing the metalic taste of blood to be in his mouth, Naruto chose to simply jump above the huge animal before landing on it's neck, successfully bringing it down on it's stomach in pain.

"That FUCKING Uchiha." He cursed as he jumped over the animal, realizing the poison must still have trace amounts in his body that were now affecting his chakra control. "Is there one thing that his damn poision doesn't affect?!" He continued to mutter to himself as he dodged a 64 palm strike from Hinata who had suddenly advanced. He'd known enough from Neji five years ago that it actually stung.

"What's the matter? You're not trying your hardest." Naruto said as he appeared at Hinata's back, easily taking her arms and twisting them to pin against her back, causing her to cry out. "Are the Hyuugas really _that_ weak?" Naruto said as he brought the other hand that wasn't holding her thin arms in place to run a few fingers along her jaw line, making her shiver and whimper.

"Get your hands OFF her!" Kiba yelled as he once again charged. Naruto only shrugged before throwing the female at the huge animal who caught her in one of their jaws, making sure their giant teeth didn't hurt her.

"I would just _love_ to stay here and play with you, but I have some important stuff to do and places to be, so I'm going to end this now." Naruto cheekily said as he flicked some bangs out of his piercing gaze that Akamaru and Kiba, even in their transformed state, could only growl at since they couldn't advance with Hinata in their mouth and yet couldn't put her down as it'd make an opening.

Without another warning, Naruto took the offense and appeared in front of the body in the blink of an eye before being at his each of his legs, landing a decisive kick or punch to each and causing the animal to crumple once again. He then ended his attack by doing a double kick to both heads. There was a giant poof of smoke, it clearing in a few seconds before it revealed Kiba lying over Hinata, as if still trying to protect her, as Akamaru whined a few feet away.

"Human emotions just make you pathetic." Naruto scoffed as he realized Kiba intended to protect Hinata down to his life.

"They make you vulnerable." He continued to rant as he grabbed the Inuzuka by his neck, hoisting him to dangle in the air as he'd done with Shino not five minutes before, but this time his body had gone back to normal and so wasn't burning the brown haired teen.

"You're wrong." Kiba managed to struggle out as he rose his hands to try and pull away Naruto's iron grip. It was all in vain.

"You know the feeling...fucking hypocrite. You're...strongest when...protecting...someone." Kiba growled out as he actually had enough strength, even in his lack of oxygen, to kick Naruto in his wound. He put a hand to his now open again abrasion, thinking of how he'd been so careful in no opening it during the fight and _still..._

"That time it _DID_ tickle." Naruto growled out as he flew Kiba against a boulder nearby, the teen hearing with a smirk a sickening crack as his head banged against the hard rock.

"I've already had my fill of killing weaklings lately with Kabuto and Sasuke...so I think I'll let you live. _Someone_ has to go running back to that accused village with his tail tucked between his legs to tell them about me. Put some fear into that rotting village." Naruto said as he went over to Hinata, grabbing a good ten kunai and shuriken from his pouch. He crouched down to her unconcious form, running the kunai lightly across her pale face and causing a few drop of red to spill at the shallow cut.

"Don't you dare..." Kiba growled as he struggled to stand, wiping blood that had been coming down from her head to run into his eyes.

"What-_EVER_ are you talking about?" Naruto asked as he threw the kunai he'd just used on Hinata's face at the older teenager, causing Kiba's arm to be pinned against the boulder as it went straight through his forearm. But the black eyed ninja refused to cry out in pain, he wouldn't give Naruto that satisfaction.

"Shall _you_ take them all then?" Naruto asked as he threw three more, one going into his other forearm while the other two went into his tighs. Kiba didn't voice his answer as it wasn't needed. Naruto chuckled darkly as he threw the remaining metal into his once fellow shinobi.

Kiba's head lowered as blood dribbled out, now in too much in pain to scream out.

"But you know..." Naruto said as he made his way to Hinata again, grabbing one last kunai.

"I wanted to smell her sweet blood...you don't mind, right? Females tend to look the best in red...or at least to _me_." He said as his tongue licked his canine fangs that protruded out from his lip, longer and sharper then Kiba's.

"No...don't..." Kiba struggled out as his eyes widened in fear, but found that with no strenght left, he couldn't break away from the weapons that held him to the slate of rock.

"Too later." Naruto said as he brought down the kunai to pierce the Hyuuga's flesh just between her breasts, causing her to wake with a scream.

"Until later." He saluted before he was off.

As he left the river behind, entering the forest of green again, he lightly sighed as he thought of how _great_ a reunion _that_ had been. And also of how he'd just gotten the reacking scent of blood off of him only for it to engulf him again, making his head slightly dizzy and his nose to burn.

First thing to do when he got to Pein was taking a shower.

X - X - X

Kakashi blinked his uncovered eye as he looked at Sasuke's sleeping, tranquil face that was illuminated in moonlight. He, along with ten other ANBU members, were keeping watch on him even as he slept. Although the thirty one year old was the only one visible in the room, the other ten were outside and holding various positions.

"Has he changed at all?"

At the soft voice, the masked man turned to see Sakura at the door frame, still wearing a stained white apron and hat as she'd just gotten off of her hospital shift in the ER section.

"He's the same." Kakashi answered with a hidden smile behind his mask, thinking of how she'd no doubt saved a handful of lives with her skill tonight.

"I see..." Sakura said as she walked up to the side of the bed where Kakashi sat on, hesitantly lifting a trembling hand to place on his heart. It had been two days since they'd found out with Tsunade that he was still alive. Sakura still couldn't believe it, even as she felt his now strong heartbeat. She gasped as she felt a hand being placed over hers and found it to be Kakashi's. She glanced down at her teacher, his head down as he seemed to find the hospital's checkered floor more interesting then her pretty face.

"You don't need to worry Sakura. He'll wake up." He encouraged gruffly, not really used to dealing with someone who had a broken heart just as bad as him. They'd both been one, of many in the entire shinobi's history, to lose people who were very precious to them. But Sasuke was still alive...maybe Sakura could be the blossoming, happy youth that she used to be.

"I know." Sakura breathed out shakily as she turned her hand to tightly grasp Kakashi's, causing him to look up at her. He grinned again as he saw the same spark of fire he'd first seen years ago that had died out when her two teammates had left.

But their self-strengthening moment was cut short as a machine that Sasuke was hooked up to in the room suddenly beeped loudly. Taking her hand away from Kakashi's, Sakura hurried to the monitor as Kakashi stood up.

"What was that?" Kakashi asked as he looked at the freaking out machine that had it's lights flashing as if it was having a seizure.

Sakura couldn't say anything as she grabbed Sasuke's hand in her comforting ones.

Kakashi's eyes moved from the beeping machine lights to see with alarm that Sasuke's eyes had started to twitch. Finally, after what seemed like years to the standing two in the room, Sasuke opened his pure black eyes to look around in a daze before his lips moved to whisper one word...

"Naruto."

X - X - X

Branches nicked the bare chested teenager as he leaped through the forest, but Naruto didn't pay much mind as he knew in the next second whatever scrape that had been inflicted would heal up. The blond cursed as he tried for another ninjutsu. Still no use. Hopefully, he wouldn't get into anymore frays as he couldn't use any ninjutsu for one, but more importantly it would take up more time and he needed to get to Pein as soon as possible, each second counting as one lost until he was there.

He growled in amusement as he noticed that he was catching up to his normal speed but when he felt a pang, he looked down to see that his wound had reopened even more and it was now bleeding more then ever - again. Groaning in annoyance, he stopped with a thud on a thick branch and ripped off the bottom cloth of his pants, making them shorts now, to make a haphazard bandage to tie around his thin waist to stop the leaking of blood that would give away his position and trail.

After a good hour of going at beyond break neck speed, he had to stop to reexamine the wound to find it now seeping through the dark cloth. Snarling in annoyance, he finally intentionally focused the creation of new cells in that area but found that he couldn't as the poison avoided this task from being completed. Naruto full out roared as his frustration couldn't be pinned back anymore. As he felt his throat vibrate and his lungs constrict, he thought of how he wished Sasuke was still alive so that he could kill him all over again, in the worst and most painful way possible too. Then he'd keep him alive, just so he could do it all again.

But as his outcry ended and he dropped his head to look at his feet, he knew that this wasn't possible as he was sure he'd die from that wound in the stomach as he'd intentionally pierced through three organs that were essential to live, his stomach being the main one and the one that would hurt him the most as it's acid would leak out to destroy his other insides.

Knowing he couldn't use ninjutsu to help with his travel, he pushed his long leg muscles to the max so that he could go even faster even if it made his wound pang even more. Smirking through the pain, each leap causing him to break through the canopy and fly about five hundred feet before landing and then taking off once again, the long periods in the air making him feel like he was flying.

Finally, after five hours of constant leaping, he stopped as he lightly panted, lifting his head to smell for any other scents, now being precarious from his meeting with Team 8. If they were here, he was pretty sure that they wouldn't be the only ones as he knew the new Hokage wouldn't be that stupid, even if she was blond (and a woman to boot).

As he broke through the canopy once again, he blinked as he saw something flying next to him.

"What're you doing, un?" Naruto heard Deidara say as he had a long enough flight to hear it all before he disapeared into the green again before jumping up again and saying, "More like what are YOU doing here?"

Having to wait until Naruto went through another leap, the fellow blond answered "I was doing my patrol duty when I spotted you here, un."

"Why are you doing patrol here?" Naruto asked through another leap.

"Come up here, un." Deidara was obviously annoyed with the choppy speak from Naruto's non-constant position in the air. Shrugging, the shorter haired blong landed a final time on the top of a pine before angling himself so that he landed on the back of the bird behind Deidara.

"_Like I said_, I was doing patrol duty."

"But this isn't your assigned place right now." Naruto argued with furrowed eyebrows as he rechecked his wound, finding it'd finally stopped bleeding.

"Well, seems like YOU haven't been informed of anything lately, un." He snorted as he took a sharp turn, causing Naruto's arms to grab onto the clay animal to steady his body and not fall off.

"What're you talking about?"

"Leader will explain it when we get the the base, un." Deidara didn't answer the teenager fully, making Naruto loll his tongue out in distaste.

"Alright." Naruto shrugged as he started to heat up his body again slightly, not liking how the fast moving air around him was making his bare chest start to tingle with cold.

After getting a good degree that was toasty warm, not noticing how it was slightly melting the clay, Naruto actually sighed as he felt the wind through his hair. He allowed his legs to hold him on the bird as he lifted his hands to let the air go through his fingers. He glanced up at the pinkie ring and frowned as he thought he should now take it off. But when he tried to, he found that he couldn't. He must have started grunting in annoyance, for Deidara looked over his shoulder to see what was up with the shorter haired blond.

"It's not going to come off, un." He informed.

"What?" Naruto questioned between grinding teeth.

"It doesn't come off until death. Or you get your hand chopped off, un!" He laughed, obviously the ending statement meant as a joke to Orochimaru.

"And did you manage to kill the snake?" Deidara continued on from his previous thought on the ex-member.

"I'll explain at the base." Naruto grumbled, not wanting to have to repeat himself even if it was a simple yes or no. Turning away with now a frown, Deidara stayed silent.

Turning his eyes from Deidara's long flowing hair, Naruto looked down at the ring. He closed his cerulean eyes in hope that Pein wouldn't scold him for it. Physical pain was one thing, but when you were shut in a eight by eight room for a week, almost dying of boredom and stiffness, that was a different story. The leader had created this unique punishment for only Naruto since simple pain didn't work since his special body healed it right up.

But leaving those disagreeable thoughts aside since he knew there was nothing he could do but explain his story in truth, the blond could only look up at the afternoon sky and wonder what was to become of him next.

X - X - X

"Tsunade! TSUNADE!" Sakura screeched as she flew through the door frame into the large room of her mentor who didn't even bother to look up from the work on her desk.

"_What_ Sakura? You know I have pa-"

"_Sasuke's awake_!" Sakura interrupted, Tsunade finally looking up to see how the pink haired teenager's eye were alight, shining in happiness that Tsunade had never seen before.

"When did he wake up?" The older woman asked as she stood, throwing her jacket on as she calmly walked to her pupil who seemed to be seven, not seventeen, as she was so excited she was bouncing in place, the grin on her face almost looking painful to make as it stretched over a good portion of her face.

"Just now, a minute ago." Sakura said breathlessly, her heart beating so fast that it almost hurt.

"Alright, calm down now. Remember you're a shinobi." Tsunade said as she gave a pointed look up at Sakura as the younger was taller by a half inch. Sakura's eyes widened before she blushed in embarassment. She had been so caught up with it all that she had just shot away all of her composure.

"I-I'm sorry." She lightly stuttered to apologize as her heart finally started to calm.

"It's alright. It happens to all of us." Tsunade sighed as she approached Sasuke's room. Her hand held the copper door knob in hesitation for a second before opening it up and gracefully walking into the room. She noted that nothing seemed out of wack as Sasuke sat on the side of the bed, his legs dangling off the edge of the high bed as he looked up at the two females.

"Lady Tsunade." Kakashi said as he nodded his head, alerting her of his presense that was just accross of her from the doorframe. Tsunade nodded back before going to the Uchiha's bed, bringing a chair to sit in front of him.

"Alright, I have a lot of questions that you better have answers to." She growled out as she cracked her knuckles. Sakura's face paled a little as she stood behind the chair with Kakashi. Was Tsunade going torture him? Sure he was a rouge ninja who had betrayed the village but...but......what? She blinked as she suddenly realized he had done almost nothing good in his life for the village. He had only hurt everyone around him. She winced as she further realized he had done nothing to earn her respect, her trust. He had only just ignored and hurt her too. Green eyes that used to be so lively just seconds ago suddenly glazed over as she wondered how she hadn't realized this sooner. Was love really that blind?

There was silence as Sasuke only smirked, switching his eyes from the current Hokage to Sakura's down head, and then to his former teacher who only glarred back just as hard with his own unfeeling onyx.

"I see the welcoming party hasn't arrived yet." Sasuke finally scoffed as he leaned back on his palms on the bed.

"Just answer our questions." Kakashi answered sharply with a growl hidden underneith. He once held the older man's respect and place in his heart as a student, but no more. He considered the Uchiha even more dead then Obito.

"Actually..." Sasuke drifted off as his eyes once again focused on Sakura's partially hidden face, "I think that I have something that will interest you."

Tsunade only grit her teeth as she starred at his dangerously handsome face. She knew that there was nothing that could really be more important then her questions, but she would just bare it.

"Naruto is still alive."

Tsunade hadn't ever been so wrong.

X - X - X

"Why has Team Eight still not reported?" Neji voiced out. The other five heads nodded in recognition, all thinking the same thing. It had been a few days since the six had meet up. They had first not been worried about the aspect of the third team but, seeing as so much time had passed, it had started to worry the teens.

"You don't think that anything happened...?" Tenten asked with a slight undertone of worry. She wasn't exactly friends with the younger three, but they were fellow shinobi of the same village non-the-less.

"What was that?" Ino suddenly asked in panic as she heard a twig snap close by. The five stayed silent as they heard another twig snap, and then another. Then labored breaths and sluggish steps could be heard as it vibrated through the mysterious forest.

"What..." Shikamaru dwalded off as his cigarette hung loosely from his mouth, the smoke curling around his face that was now on alert.

When they saw a gasping Shino carrying Hinata and a barely conscious, heavily bleeding Kiba who was heavily leaning on a limping Akamaru, they couldn't have been more shocked.

"Help..." Kiba stuggled out while letting go of Akamaru's stained fur to drop to his knees, covering his mouth to try and muffle a dry cough. He took his hand away to find that he had coughed up even more blood.

"What happened?!" Ino said in fright as she crouched down to Hinata who had been her close friend for a few years now.

"N...N..." But Kiba wasn't able to say anything before he was finally gave into the darkness and he went unconscious, Shino quick to follow since he still couldn't breath properly and so hadn't been able to say anything at all.

"Ino, you need to heal them right now. It's amazing that they're already still alive." Shikamaru instructed as he crouched down at Kiba's side, starting to take off his jacket and shirt, finding in disgust all the gashes that were obviously inflicted by kunai and shuriken.

"But..." She whispered out as she unzipped Hinata's jacket to find in horror the stab wound in her chest.

"You can do it." Shikamaru encouraged as he grabbed her smaller hand and squeezed. Ino sniffed as she took her hand away from his to rub at her nose, refusing to cry.

"Of course I can." She said as her hands started to glow as she started with Hinata. She then moved onto Kiba, finding all ten gashes and his massive head injury. She was deeply surprised that he hadn't died of blood loss, deeming he was only able to continue out of pure stubborness and refusal to let him and his team down. That damn loyalty made her heart twinge in praise. Finally going through Shino who was not as bad as Kiba thanks to Hinata's previous healing, and finally Akamaru who had several broken bones, she slouched down in utter exaustion. She knew that she had used up too much of her chakra and was now running dangerously low, but it couldn't be helped as she needed to do that if she wanted the four to survive to see tomorrow. It was the least she could do for her friends.

Gasping as black started to creep into her eyes, she followed Team 8 into unconciousness just as Shikamaru caught her so that she didn't fall on the hard ground.

"Good job." He whispered as he arranged her to comfortably lay down next to the other wounded three.

"This is what I was dreading would happen." Neji said as he put a hand to his chin to try and think of the next step in this crazy goose chase for the Akatsuki.

"What are we going to do, we're now three down." TenTen voiced too as she crossed her arms, sitting down on a log that they'd dragged over.

"We're not heading back." Shikamaru finally asserted his leadership in a steady voice as he started getting a fire ready since it would be dark fairly soon.

"I agree!" Lee finally spoke as he shot his hand into the air.

"We're not going back, don't worry. And we're not three down just yet, they'll recover in a day, enough time for us to think of a plan." Neji said as he looked over to Shikamaru who nodded in agreement.

"Then lets all go to sleep and talk again in the morning." TenTen said with a serious nod.

The fellow shinobi ate a fast dinner, complementary of Chouji, before they all undid their mats and tried to sleep, although none really got much as they were too wired from Team 8's attack.

As morning finally dawned with bright sunlight and twittering birds, Ino was the first to awake.

"Whoa..." She groaned as she raised a hand to her pounding head since she'd sat up too quickly.

"Take it easy, drink this." Chouji offered a hot beverage to the blond that she took with a smile and thanks.

Not far after, Kiba awoke with a yelp and jolt, as if coming out of an exorcism.

"Hey! Take it easy, your youthfulness is unneccesary right now!" Lee exclaimed as he was at Kiba's side, steadying the younger with his strong arms.

"Where is he, WHERE IS HE?!" Kiba bellowed in such a feral voice that it made Ino wince behind her steaming cup.

"Calm down, who are you talking about?" Shikamaru asked as he stood infront of Kiba.

"That damn, fucktarded, ass wipe of a demon..." Kiba overly swore as he shrugged off Lee's grasp a little too roughly, causing Lee's bushy brows to furrow.

"That is not the flowery talk of usual youths." He chided.

"Yeah, well if you'd been royally fucked over and almost FUCKING KILLED by a former shinobi you would understand." He growled in the older teen's face, his statement causing everyone's curiousity to spike.

"Explain." Shikamaru commanded and just as Kiba opened his mouth to start, a wail filled the air.

"Hinata!" Kiba gasped as he turned to his female teammate who had gone into the fedal position, yet her cries could be easily heard.

"It's alright, everything's fine now, he's gone." Kiba tried to comfort as his arms went around her shoulders and forced her to rest in his chest. Not resisting, actually accepting the dog-nin boy, Hinata desperatly grabbed onto his thin chest and used his torn shirt as a absorber for her tears.

There was silence for a good five minutes as she kept crying before her loud bawls turned into quiet snivels.

"What happened Kiba?!" TenTen couldn't hold back the bewildered question that had plauged her mind for a good twelve hours now from first seeing them.

"Naruto is what happened." Kiba whispered as he buried his nose into Hinata's silky raven haired that smelled so much better then his own blood, which had over powered his senses for the past few days.

"What does-" But Shikamaru was cut off as Kiba continued on with, "He's alive and he's joined the Akatsuki. He's totally fucked up, did all this to the three of us plus more since Hinata had healed me and Shino before."

"Wait...Naruto?!" Chouji questioned in disbelief, finding the chips in his hands to be suddenly unappetizing.

"Yeah, dumb, bubbly, cheerful Naruto? Well aparantly now he's a cold blooded, sadistic killer." Kiba laid it all out, the statement causing Hinata to give a loud whimper.

X - X - X

"Naruto..." Pein said as his unique eyes trailed up and down the blond's lanky body, lingering a little too long on the wound.

"Yes, Leader?" Naruto answered, those two words being packed with feignted respect. Naruto had gotten so good at putting on the obedient face that it was practically true, even in Itachi's and Pein's special eyes.

"Why have you come back injured?" He answered the second most important question he needed to ask Naruto, wanting the blond to get into a comfortable feeling until he stuck him deep with the most important question and, depending on his answer, the consequences.

"There was some troubles with retreiving the ring, Leader. Sasuke was cowardly and stabbed me when I was engaged in a fight with Orochimaru. I didn't know it at the time, but his katakana was encased with a special no-sense poision. Not only did it take down my chakra flow so I couldn't do ninjutsu, it also made my body cells slow down with their reproductive aspect. Because of that, it is now just beginning to heal." He explained in length, yet as short as he could make it.

"Sasori, come here." Pein ordered the puppet member to come. Almost reluctantly getting up from the chair he had been sitting on, having been working on another puppet model, he made his way over to the orange haired leader.

"Yes Leader?" He asked like Naruto, eyes glassed over in boredom as he stopped his short walk.

"I want you to look at Naruto's wound. Extricate the poison from Naruto."

"What will I do with it after?" Sasori asked quietly, eyeing the still angry wound on Naruto's bare stomach.

"To enhance and use for your weapons of course. If what Naruto says is true, it will be another handy asset for you, yes?" Pein didn't exactly feel like he needed to say the explination as he knew the puppet master was already thinking about it.

"How thoughtful of you Leader. Thank you." Sasori said before bowing to show further gratitude.

"My mistake, I didn't know that you wanted this for research, but I've already washed and cleaned it. I don't think there's any more poison left." Naruto voiced after Sasori's shallow bow to Pein.

"I bet there's some deeper in. I'll just have to...open it up and see, if you get what I mean." Sasori said in his same monotone, yet Naruto held down a growl as he could have sworn he'd head a light trace of amusement.

"Now, onto more pressing issues." Pein put them back on track, "Why are you already wearing Orochimaru's ring?"

Naruto stayed silent as he looked at his bare footed feet. He'd forgotten he'd left his sandals at the river. He was just glad that he'd put his headband into his pant pocket or else he would have forgotten that too and it was the only thing he didn't want to lose. But finally looking up the most powerful person in the room and his ringed eyes, Naruto rubbed a knuckle against the cool and reassuring metal in his pocket.

"I was afraid of it dropping out of my coat and so I put it on my finger so I wouldn't lose it. It's so small, ya know?." Naruto offered with a crooked smile.

"That's the worst fucking excuse I've ever heard in my whole fucking life." Hidan offered from his place as he scratched his mass of white hair, vivid eyes narrowed at Naruto.

"It's true. Just look at me now, I was bathing in the river and was forgetful of my coat so it washed down stream. And while my stuff lay on the bank, my hat blew away and deer started eating my sandals." Naruto shrugged in partial truth.

On his way here on Deidara's bird, he'd chewed on the idea of telling Pein about Team 8 and the high probability that they weren't the only ones out there. If he told the truth, he wouldn't get in trouble because it wasn't his fault, but he also wouldn't benefit from it in any way. In the end, as the cutting air whipped at his smirking face, he'd decided that he wouldn't tell Pein or the others about the incident. It would be overly entertaining to see how they would react, and Naruto hadn't had anything entertaining happen in his life anytime soon. He couldn't remember the last time he'd had some genuine amusement and this had scenario had some promise. Would they panic and flee? Stay and fight, maybe a few of them dying off or would they slaughter all the enemies? Naruto thought he deserved at least _something_ to lift his mood since he'd been fucked over numerous times recently.

"Still, that is not nearly enough of a reason to put it on without my permission." Pein brought Naruto back from his sting-pulling thoughts.

The blond chose to stay silent, his pride not allowing him to say those two words of '_I'm sorry_.' He hadn't in a few years, and like hell was he going to now.

"You will receive punishment for this heedless action, that of which I have yet to determine. For now, go with Sasori."

_/'Because being dissected by him isn't enough...'/_ Naruto wryly thought while supressing a shiver and past memories of waking up in mid-operation because Sasori had forgotten to put in more anesthesia. And it didn't help that those incidents, Naruto wasn't told of them at all. All Sasori did was wait till he fell asleep and then he would start, while a laughing in amusement Deidara would watch.

But those thoughts were pushed aside as Naruto gave a side-long glance at Sasori who now had a reserved smile on his unchanging face.

"That is all. You are free to return to your rooms." Pein finished the meeting as he got up himself, Konan silently following him. But she glanced back to look at Naruto, and with the flick of her thin wrist propelled something at him. With fast reflexes, Naruto caught it before it hit him in the head, lowering it to see it was a paper rose like the one in her hair. He looked up, intending to give her a disparing grin, but found that she'd already left.

"Shall we?" Sasori asked with that smile that was still plastered on his eternally handsome face.

"We shall." Naruto held down the groan in his voice as he followed the shorter member, ignoring the snickering from Deidara and Hidan.

X - X - X

As Naruto looked up at the blinding light above him, he closed his eyes to try and get ride of the light, but it still filtered through his thin eyelids.

"Are you ready yet?" The blond asked in irritation to the light red head, at to which Sasori's eyebrows lightly furrowed.

"Be patient."

"Says the most impatient person I know." Grumbled Naruto under his breath, but Sasori heard it and it only caused his eyebrows to furrow more.

"I'm taking this time because it seems that I have run out of anesthesia. I haven't had a _live_ patient in countless years so it would be unnecessary." Sasori informed after another good minute of searching around his large workspace that he'd set up here.

"So you mean..." Naruto blanched as he stuck his tongue out as if he'd tasted something extremely sour.

"Yes. You'll have to do it without it." Sasori said as he turned aorund, all signs of being irrtated gone as his face was now fixed in impassiveness like usual.

"_Hell_ no." Naruto snapped, "I'm not a fucking masochist like some people around here." He continued on as he sat up from the table and hoped down. He turned his head to the door, thinking he'd heard someone curse on the other side in the hallway, but was broken from that as Sasori spoke up again.

"You don't want to irritate Leader-sama any more, do you?" Sasori asked innocently. Cursing under his breath, the teen thought about how Sasori knew how to manipulate people just as well as his puppets sometimes.

Naruto ground his teeth before getting back up onto the table and lying down again.

"I can always knock you out with a hit to the head." Sasori offered.

"I think you'd accidentally kill me." Naruto tried to joke, trying not to think about the shiny sharp knife in Sasori's hand which was getting closer and closer to his wound that he'd finally thought he could put behind him. Naruto really hated how fucked up life was for him sometimes.

With a easy shrug of understanding, not denying his assumption, Sasori finally brought the scalpel down to make the first incision.

And as Naruto tried to push the pain out of head, the teen could have sworn he'd heard now laughter form behind the door in the hallway, but it could have just been the grinding of his own teeth from the searing torture from Sasori who was lightly humming in his haven, thinking about how Naruto would make a pretty good puppet when the time came. He would have to ask Leader-sama about it soon...

* * *

Glossary/Notes:

If you're like, _'Suck it up Hinata'_, just...give her a little time. It'll get better. And hey, her longtime crush just tried to kill her. Give her at least _some_ props.

The part about Naruto being dissected by Sasori in the middle of the night (countless times) came from the series _Soul Eater_, specifically from the partially-insane character who is just SO awesome

Some things you should know about my writing/opinions (should have done this sooner) -

1. I don't like Sasuke (if you couldn't tell). I'm not going to outwardly bash him, but I'm not going to give him glory either.

2. I am a shipper. I like pairing people, whether it be love interest or family ties, but know that this will not take away from the story line or main focus which I like more action/adventure for Naruto like the original manga/anime. If nothing else, love always helps with drama and is a good backdrop.


	4. Falling Awake

**Chapter 4 : Falling Awake**

_You never get to choose, you live on what they sent you.  
And you know they're gonna use, the things you love against you.  
I could learn to play the game, I could learn to run the hustle.  
If I only had the brains, the money or the muscle.  
Falling awake, falling awake..._

* * *

Tsunade sighed as she stamped the last paper of the day, or the last one she swore she'd read and sign for today (it seemed like a never ending sea), and placed the detested paper on top of the messy pile of other political papers that had been offically read, passed, and signed. Immediatly, Shizune clapped her hands together once and hid a smile of glee before grabbing the stack of papers and rushing out the door, making sure not to let one single _precious_ paper flutter away. But before the thin short haired lady could get to and out the door, the blond monarch finally spoke up.

"Now that _that_ is done, call in Asuma and the other two." Tsunade called before leaning back in her chair, allowing to crack her knuckles in satisfaction for the paperwork of today being defeated. She almost felt like her fingers were going to fall off, and not because she'd done medical procedures. What a waste of her energy.

"Right away Tsunade-sama," the loyal assistant said before using her backside to wedge open the doors and go out, allowing them to swing shut on her superior.

Twisting around in her chair, Tsunade looked out of her wide windows into the prosperous village that she reigned over. Allowing a heavy sigh to pass through her lips, she rubbed her temples as thoughts of how much responsibility was now on her shoulders, missing the past days of drinking and gambling before sleeping for days all to start the process again. Just thinking about it made her chest twinge in lose.

"Hokage-sama?"

A deep voice broke her of her nastalgic thoughts and with another sigh, this one heavier still, swiveled back so that her chair was forward. She looked up to face the three Jōnin who stood tall and straight before her clustered desk.

"Asuma, Gai, Kurenai." The blond Kage nodded to them all seperatly, her eyes trailing a tad bit longer on Kurenai then the other two males.

"I'm sure you know why you've been called here."

"Yes," they answered in unison.

"Unfortunatly, there is a change of plans." At this, two tensed while one looked at the floor in guilt, absently placing a hand on her stomach.

"Kurenai will be unable to attend the mission with you two." Tsunade made sure to alliterate right as she crossed her hands in front of her mouth and leaned forward, elbows taking the weight on the desk.

As if a rocket had gone off in her body, Kurenai whipped her head up to look at the blond with wide red eyes, while the other three in the room moved their eyes to her.

"So it is decided that Asuma and Gai will go as a two man team." Tsunade nodded before continuing, "You will meet at the gate at 0400 hours tomorrow. Tardiness is inexcusable as I will be there to send you off."

Asuma was about to ask why Kurenai wasn't allowed on the mission, but Tsunade continued without missing a beat, "You two are excused. I need to speak in private with Kurenai for a few minutes."

Now knowing that his chance was lost, the smoking Jōnin gave a final glance to his lover before leaving the office, Gai having already left with a yell of 'youthfulness.'

There was silence between the two powerful kunoichi before Kurenai broke it with a simple and sincere, "Thank you."

Tsunade nodded dully before, "But are you sure this is what you want? He doesn't even know."

Kurenai bit her lip to stop tears from falling down her beautiful face before manageing to choke out "I know he wants to fight, to protect his team. And who am I to hold him back?" She asked, trying to hold down all her bitterness, yet some still managed to soak through.

Tsunade sighed before waving her hand, signaling for her to leave as to which she did before a deep bow.

Turning her chair once again to the window, her sigh came out more like a groan as she watched the clouds float by. She dwelled on how she'd take all the paperwork in the world rather then have to make another decision like that; one that broke up a family that hadn't even had a chance to start because of bloody warfare.

X - X - X

Naruto sighed in relief as she allowed the door of Sasori's workshop to creak to a close behind him, finally leaving the inhuman red head behind. Allowing his arms to go over his head to arch his body in a stretch, he almost groaned out loud as he felt the tight stitches in his side. With his arms still above him, crossed over his head now, the blond started walking down the fairly long hallway, looking at the various rooms that had the names of the other ten members for identification, he finally arrived at what looked to be the living room, or get together place. On one side, there was a long table where Naruto had been questioned when he came back. There was also a few couches along with another small table with chairs. In front of the couches, there was a large TV where a few of the top criminals where watching. Or they were until Naruto walked in.

"Had fun, un?" Dediara asked with a sadistic smirk.

"Tons," Naruto mumbled as he moved his arms to cross over his bare chest. But his blue eyes didn't linger on the fellow blond for long before he saw the kitchen and felt his stomach growl in pity for itself.

Ignoring how he heard the clay snicker as Naruto passed by him, the teen opened the fridge with enough force to rip the door off if his strength hadn't gone at the sight of all the wonderous food in there. But even with the tempting meat that he was sure to have made Kyuubi drool and whine like a puppy, or the spicy curry that would have made his mouth tingle in satisfaction, he closed the door and turned to the cabinets and opened the first in his sight to grin in satisfatcion.

"I don't see how you can eat so much ramen all the time. I would get sick of it," Kisame said from his place on the small table with Itachi who looked to be reading a long scroll.

"And I don't see how you ate sashimi that one time," Naruto shot back as he went to the sink to fill a bowl with water, his other hand holding the dry noodles in it's Styrofoam enclosure.

If possible, Kisame's face became even more blue and he stuck out his tongue in distaste before his eyebrows furrowed and he snaped, "That was only because I was drunk."

"Hn. Didn't know fish could get drunk." Naruto offered only a feral grin as he sat down next to the blue man and Uchiha, the later of the two only giving the blond a fleeting glance before turning back to his parchments.

"And I didn't know that a fox had to get stiches." The giant sword dealer obviously wasn't backing down anytime soon.

Naruto choose to only bare his teeth before focusing his attention on the bowl of water he was holding. He simply put his index finger in before the water for a few seconds, heating up his finger like before so the water was then instantly heated. Then taking the steaming liquid, he easily poured it into the colorfully packaged instant food before putting his chopsticks on top of the paper lid to allow it to sit and cook. Naruto found it extremely annoying that he really had no power to make these three minutes of hell go by any faster without ruining his precious noodles.

There was silence as Hidan and Deidara continued to watch the buzzing TV from their seperate couches while Kisame glarred at Naruto and Naruto glared at his ramen, all while Itachi placidly read. Therefore it was quite surprising why it was the most quiet of the five would break the silence with his cool question.

"Why is your chakra flow out of order?"

Naruto looked up the dangerously face of Itachi, his face as empty as even even as he asked the quesiton in his irritating monotone, or at least in Naruto's opinon.

To answer the question, the blond scoffed before, "I told you. It was your stupid little brother's poison that screwed up my entire system."

"No" Itachi spoke rejecting Naruto's answer and causing him and Kisame to blink in surprise, yet the black haired murder continued, "You have always had two strings of chakra. Now you only have a struggling one, no doubt from the poison. What happened to the other one?"

Naruto almost grimaced as he thought of how he'd gotten caught. Itachi's observation was right on the spot, it was true that one of his chakras had gone away in how the Kyuubi had been sealed away for a week. But the blond had to think fast, he didn't want to tell the organization about how he'd used the important seal that they'd ordered him to use in only very dire situations, and so decided in that second to go with his excuse of before.

"I bet it's the poison. I can't think of any other reason," he flat out lied as he looked at the clock, allowing a feral grin to adorn his handsome features as he opened the lid again and stuck his nose in the steam, allowing himself a large whiff of the heavenly smell, or at least to Naruto. Kisame, on the other hand, blanched at the fake smell, still wondering why he'd pick something so cheap and simpleminded when they had the best food in the fridge.

Itachi allowed his dark eyes to focus on the scarfing down teen for a few more seconds before turning back to his papers, Naruto could only assume that he'd accepted the answer and allowed the issue to slip away.

There was no more talking as the TV filled the room with a lull of noise that Naruto's slurps easily matched, so enthusiastic in being able to _finally_ eat that he'd forgotten all sorts of manners, not even looking over to Kisame as a piece of noodle flung just past his face. It would have hit the fish man's cheek had he not moved in the last second. This time it was Hidan who filled the air with his bousterous voice.

"Even though I know you're a fucking brat, I still can't believe you lost to a fucking poison," the white haired immortal stated with a twitch of his lips.

Naruto paused just as he was about to scoop another mouthful of noodles into his mouth, carefully putting down the food while opening his stunning blue eyes to glare at Hidan.

"Before I sensed it, it had circulated through my whole body and I wasn't too keen to purge myself of all my blood and then so die," Naruto snapped matter-of-factly, although he wished he could had just used the tactic of punch-in-the-face.

"If you had told us that, I could have just extracted some blood and strained it out."

Naruto couldn't help but let his face pale as he turned to see Sasori at the hallway entrace into the larger room, a cloth his his hands as he tried to wipe all of Naruto's blood of, which made the blood 'donor' himself want to gag. He always hated the sight and smell of his own blood. In retrospect, he really just hated blood in general. Always so flashy, overpowering and...unneccessary almost in his mind.

"What?" Naruto chocked out as he put a hand to his stitches put in not ten minutes before.

"I could have just taken a sample from you blood, and we could have been done."

Naruto tried to ignore the howls from Diedara and Hidan, Kisame even chuckling next to him, as he swallowed the lump in his throat. All that poking, cutting, and prodding could have been avoided if he'd just told the red head or Pein that it'd circulated through his entire system?!

"Oh well, nothing we can do about it now." Sasori grinned like he was a fat tabby who had finally caught the pretty canary.

Turning back to his ramen, Naruto suddenly didn't feel very hungry as the pains in his stomach increased.

"Wow, aren't you just _perfect, _UN!_"_

"I wonder if you screw up on _everything_?" Hidan added after Deidara as their laughing finally started to calm down. Naruto wanted to slap himself as he recognized their laugh to be the same as he'd heard outside Sasori's room, having just thought it was his imagnination. Now he knew that it wasn't and was just the two of them trying to listen into his personal hell.

At their comments, it having been the last straw for the blond's anger, Naruto slammed his palm on the table, Kisame raising an eyebrow with Itachi as they saw it crack, before getting up and standing in front of Hidan and Deidara.

"Wanna say something fucker?" Hidan cut shot his laughter at the sight of the bare chested, lanky teenager in front of him who had a eerily calm face, yet the immortal knew that was only because Naruto was really boiling inside. This was the best time to fuck around with the kid.

"Oh, I just wanted to say something to your guys." He said with an impassive shrug of his bony shoulders.

"And that'd be, un?" Deidara snapped, thinking he was going to try and ruin their fun.

"Just that your moms must have been dogs and your dads must have been donkeys, because you guys are sure two, _grade A,_ jackass sons of bitches."

Hidan and Deidara both blinked as Kisame chocked on the water he had been drinking, Itachi absently slapping a hand on his back as to try and clear it.

"Oh, I'm going to fucking KILL-" Deidara started, but stopped as Hidan put a hand in front of him, having just about to pounce on the ready younger blond.

"Let me handle this," the Jashin follower stated with a grin of amusement up at Naruto, which he easily returned.

Getting up with a fluid motion, Hidan stood and crossed his arms over his own bare chest, having just gotten stitched up like Naruto, but by Kakuzu.

"You're the cum your mamma should have swallowed." Hidan said with a hidden growl of statisfaction as Naruto's eyes widened the slightest bit, thinking about the file for a split second before it was overwhelmed with the selfcontrol of not jumping the white haired masocist right there.

Igrnoring the 'oooh' from Deidara on the couch, Naruto managed to compose himself with a fanged smile before, "You're so gay, that if someone said "assume the possition" you bend over."

Hidan's eyebrow twitched, making Naruto's smirk now genuine, before coming back with, "_You're_ so gay you make Tobi look straight!"

Naruto tried not to gag and failed.

X - X - X

Tsuande allowed another sigh to pass through her plump lips as she continued to look out the windows, thinking about the decision she'd just made of allowing Asuma to go on the mission, but also how she was allowing Kurenai to keep Asuma in the dark. In the blond Kage's opinion, the concept of a faimly was one of the most sacred gifts that could be given to someone. It never fazed to amaze her how some people though it was more of a problem. But in this world of constant strife and grief, there was a point in disenchantment.

As if he'd been called, one of the most lonesome ninja in the village came sauntering though her door. As always, his silver hair was leaning to one side in an amazing, no gel added, gravity defying act as his one visible eye kept its half open appearance. But there was a few things off of the Copy Nin's usual personage, those being his precious book or his slouched position. Instead his back was straight and his arms were stiff at his sides.

"Kakashi," the pigtailed woman said without turning around, her voice stiff and icy without a hint of warmth.

"Hokage-sama. I have a request," he answered in a tone that equaled hers in emptiness of emotion.

Finally twisting around with a jerk of her body, the busty woman turned to face the younger (although many wouldn't think at first sight) shinobi. Now seeing his ridgid and serious show, one of her delicate gold eyebrows rose on her marked forehead.

"What is it?" She asked as she leaned forward onto her full and messy desk.

"If Sakura asks you for a mission to search for Naruto, I would be honored if you'd allow me to escort and accompany her," he said without even crinkling his eye in amusement, which was usually the case when he talked about his only former female student.

Kakashi saw the blond's eye twitch slightly, making his curiousity spike, even more so when she shook her head and allowed a breath of laughter to go through her painted lips.

"Why don't you ask her yourself? Sakura, stop easedropping."

The silver haired Jōnin raised an eyebrow of his own as he turned his lithe body to see the door of the large room to creak open, a bashfully blushing Sakura trying to put on a facade of innocence even though she had just been caught.

"I though I had masked my chakra and scent. Even Kakashi didn't notice," the pink haired teen grumbled as she crossed her arms over her developed chest.

"I just know your habits. And you forgot about the shadow," Tsunade said with a wink, remembering how in past years when Sakura was done with all her assignments, she'd stand outside her door for hours on end to try and hear about anything important, thinking that the smiling Kage wasn't noticing.

"Well?" the monarch continued as she looked across form her pupil to Kakashi who had suddenly regained his laid back body language.

"Sakura," Kakashi said her name carefully as he turned to her, the teen in question having to surpress a shiver as she looked at the depth of his one visible, pure black eye. But she was jolted out of it with, "Can I protect you?" as he finished it with that famous hidden smile that always managed to make Sakura feel safe and to smile back.

This time was no exception and she allowed a sigh to pass through her warm lips, a smile playing upon them as she said, "I don't exactly need protecting anymore if you haven't noticed."

"I know. But the more the merrier, yes?" His corner of his eye crinkled in amusement, causing Sakura's smile to enlargen a little more.

"Fine. You always do come in handy," her smile now faded a little as quickly she reminisced the times that he'd saved her on missions they'd done through the years together, having even acclaimed the name of the Treacherous Tandem in the Bingo books. While she was indeed extremely strong, there was always the need of someone watching your back, and Sakura and Kakashi had that act down.

"Are you going to leave me out in the cold on this little party?"

At the cool voice, all three heads snapped to the doors once more to see the raven haired Uchiha with the slightest of a smirk on his striking face.

"Where are the ANBU guards?" Kakashi asked nonchalantly, although he was already fingering a few kunai in his pant pockets.

"Don't worry, they're still watching me. Tsunade-_sama_ assigned such good ones to me it'll only take half a second to kill me if they wanted."

"What is it that you want Uchiha?" Tsunade asked in a dangerous tone, yet Sasuke didn't even bat an eyelash.

"I would like to do the same as Kakashi. Accompany Sakura on her future mission to find Naruto."

Tsunade shook her head in annoyance, once again thinking of how things could have been so much easier had Jiraiya never found her. She wondered where he was for a second, not having seen him in months now, but she pushed that thought aside for another time as she looked up into the elegant black eyes of Sasuke, the orbs being focused on a slightly shocked Sakura. The Kage hide a smirk with her entertwined fingers as a thought came into her mind.

"I'm going to let Sakura decide," she stated as she leaned back in her chair again, watching how her former and most successful student would react to the decision.

The pretty teen's mouth fell open even more and she turned her eyes to Tsunade whose expression was sheilded with her hard hazel eyes and pressed thin lips. Her emerald eyes then turned to Kakashi whose own eyes were focused on Sasuke, an icy aura coming off her former teacher, before she finally allowed her bright eyes to settle on her past love. Feeling like she couldn't breath anymore, she stared into those dark jeweled eyes that made her think she was loosing her footing.

Looking away, she blinked and tried to compose herself. But as she looked back into his eyes, she felt like she could feel how earnest she wanted this. She foolishly allowed herself to believe that he truly wanted to find, and if need be _save_, Naruto.

"Like Kakashi said, the more the merrier." Except that when Sakura said this, it didn't nearly make her feel as warm as when it indicated Kakashi joining. It actually did the exact opposite, it made her feel even more detached.

Kakashi was once again glad for his concealing mask, as it hid an involuntary sigh. What emotions the long breath was trying to imply even he didn't even know.

"When will we go on the mission to find him?" Sasuke voiced what both of the other two former members of Team 7 had on their minds.

"You three are going on a mission, don't worry." Tsunade grinned, causing Sakura's face to finally lax, yet Kakashi's tightened. There was something in the voice of the present Hokage that both he and, it looked as if, Sasuke had noticed too.

"You will be going to Suna."

Sakura's face paled as she whipped to the sannin and snapping, "What?!"

"Calm down. Let me explain something, it ties in with the Akatsuki and who is supposedly 'connected' now with that organization?" The blond questioned, truly wondering what was so magnificent about a past teammate, five years ago too, that Sakura and Kakashi had known for a fairly short period of time to put everything else aside for. As she looked at Sakura's now lit up face, a thing that this genius medic had never been able to accomplish, it made her want to see and meet this child all the more.

"Please explain Hokage-sama." Kakashi asked as he took his hands out of his weapons laced pockets, choosing to cross them over his chest.

"Well, it seems as if Suna is harboring two of the tailed beast hosts there. Because that nation is supposedly the second strongest, only to us, the other nations agreed that they would put their Jinchūrikiin there for safe protection. Suna has just informed me of the move this afternoon with their fastest hawk, requesting that we help with the security. And as it is, we can't allow this organization to gain more of the tailed beasts' power. And since you two," She motioned at Sakura and Kakashi, "are a few of the strongest I have, you will be adding in the precaution. And if you manage to catch a member who tries to take the Jinchūriki, who am I to stop your interrogation of him?"

At the long explination, both Sakura and Kakashi nodded, also both of them inwardly thanked the Hokage for her understanding. Even though they both knew they had to put the village, and the entire world, in front of them own desires Tsunade had somehow allowed for them to indulge in their wants as well as protecting the overall betterment for everyone else.

"What about me? Aren't I going too?" Sasuke broke the silence as the two bowed, Tsunade's calm eyes becoming hard as she remembered about to raven haired teen.

"_You_ would like to come on this too?" she asked sharply, Sasuke not even choosing to answer that as his crossed arms and narrowed eyes told all. Of course he wanted to come, why would he drop out on such a prime opportunity to catch Naruto or Itachi, maybe even both. But he didn't allow his hopes to soar that high. If at least one of them was there, it'd be perfect.

"How do I know that you're trustworthy? You're rough ninja who just came back half dead, and now you want to A, leave the village and B, be put in a place where you could betray us _again_?"

Sasuke didn't say anything, simply looked over to Kakashi, only to find his cold, just as black as his own, eye that offered no help. Moving to Sakura, he found her rubbing one of her heels into the wood, not offering to meet up with his eyes.

"Sakura..." he whispered her name heartily, causing her to snap her head up, short hair spraying over her delicate face for a second before settling, "You know I just want to find Naruto," he continued to whisper as he dared to take a step closer to her.

Kakashi didn't take onto this lightly, favoring to step in the space between the two teens, his arms still crossed over his toned chest as he glared down his former student.

"Prove it," the silver haired man quipped quickly. Sasuke kept the eyecontact for a few seconds before looking down at his sandals, putting a few fingers to his chin in thought.

"Well, you may have my sword. Much of my power relies on it. In addition, it will always help with man power to have someone who has a more _profound_ grip on the Sharingan," he said as his face raised to look over Kakashi to Tsunade who was contemplating it all.

"Fine. ANBU," Tsunade snapped her fingers and suddenly a masked man was at her side.

"Take his sword to the vault."

"Yes Hokage-sama," the mystery man said while bowing shallowly before he was before Sasuke a split second later, his gloved hand palm up as an indication to give the sword. Sasuke, feeling the slightest sliver of dissapointment, placed the sheathed metal in the mystery man's hand before his fingers grabbed around it, nodding once before being gone froom sight once again.

"If that is all, I would like to go sleep in my hospital room. May I be dismissed?" Sasuke requested as he put his left arm around his torso, faking fatigue and refusing to finish the polite question with a smile.

Tsunade's eyes bore into his before she nodded once. So giving a short bow, the Uchiha left the room, making sure neither of the three could see his dark grin of victory as he covered it with his hand, having pretended a cough although he felt fine.

Sakura sighed before turning to the door, expecting Kakashi to follow after. But as she turned when she got to the frame she saw that he had taken a few steps closer to her mentor and seemed to be about to ask a question by the pose of crossed arms behind his straight back. The pink haired teen had just opened to mouth and was going to ask what he needed, when his deep voice filled the air with, "Hokage, is it alright if I look at the file of Naturo? I would like to check on something about his parents."

Sakura's eyebrow lifted in questioning and she closed the door before walking back to her old teacher's side, "Sakura?" he asked in slight surprise, having thought she'd left with Sasuke. She offered him a glance with her green eyes before sniffing with pride and saying, "I'm your partner in this. I should know everything you know."

"Yes, you may see it. Let me open the door for you." Tsuade interrupted Sakura just as she was about to smile back at Kakashi's hidden one, the traditional crinkle of his eye showing his amusement at her.

But as Tsuande snuck a hand between her massive cleavage to pull out a key, she flashed the two a smirk and explained, "Safest place to keep it, no?"

The young medic could only blink before her face broke out into a vicious blush or embarrassment at her mentor. Daring to glance over at Kakashi she had found that he was even more amused while looking at her red face. But Sakura didn't have to worry about his gaze any longer as Tsunade got up and went to the door, sticking the key in and turning it to open the stuffy room. She flicked on a few dim lights before walking into the room, Sakura and Kakashi waiting at the frame of the door.

They heard her lightly gasp before, "It's not here. Naruto's file and his Mother's are gone."

"Why?" Sakura asked after a pregnant silence.

"Maybe he _is_ really still alive. Or else why would someone take his file?" Tsunade wondered out loud as she stared at the spot where the two files should be, "Is there any other files missing Kakashi?" she added.

The silver haired ninja nodded before pulling his headband up, activating his Sharingan that Sakura gaped at. It never stopped surprising her how much power her teacher held, and how well he'd mastered the Uchiha bloodline weapon. His head quickly gazed around the entire room, checking for any disturbances that may have recently happened.

"Orochimaru's is gone too, making it three. But that's it," Kakashi finally answered as he covered his eye back up.

"What does this mean...?" Sakura willed herself to not stutter from her shock and her gut feeling that was telling her something very wrong was in the making.

"Could it have been an assassin? Coming to get information?" Tsunade asked as she turned to Kakashi, knowing that out of the three of them he had much more experience in that graphic area.

"It is probable. But that would mean that Naruto is their next target. And if that's the case then why would they take his Mother's file too? He is suppose to be already deceased as she is."

"So...you _don't_ think it's an assassin." Sakura tried.

"I'm not saying that it's just... it may have been Naruto himself. Trying to get ride of his existence in the village and then taking the information to go after Orochimaru."

"So Orochimaru was his target? _He_ was the assassin?"

"If Sasuke was telling the truth."

Tsunade growled as she walked out of the room with the other two, closing and locking the door before putting the key back in it's special place. But Sakura was too preoccupied with what the hell was going on to blush this time.

X - X - X

Shikamaru tried to suppress a yawn but failed. And so when he felt the first rays of sunlight of today, his mouth was wide open and eyes were tearing. But his ears perked up when he saw a deer in the far distance, it's tail twitching as it made eyecontact with the ninja. Looking around at the others one last time, Shikamaru got up. He had been last for watch duty and since it was technically now morning, he could now do what he wanted. He quietly started walking in the direction of the deer that seemed to be waiting for him to see if he'd follow it or not. From growing up on a farm with deer all his life, it must make him seem like a ally to the species and he wanted to see how things in this area were going. What better way to find out then from the things that lived there?

Ino blinked her blue eyes drearily as she heard a rustle of leaves, focusing her eyes just in time to see Shikamaru duck into the woods. She quickly got up and ran after him so as not to loose him, legs feeling stiff but working non-the-less. When she saw him lazily walking, hands in his pockets, she quickly leaped to his side. The only indication of him noticing her was his eyes widened a little before moving back to the forest in front of him, his steps never missing a beat. She was about to ask him what he was doing, but it was that moment when they came into a small clearing that had a young buck. Ino put her hands to her mouth as to hold in her gasp of surprie, but Shikamaru didn't seem any more enthusiastic at the sight then when she'd jumped to his side.

He easily continued walking towards the animal, pulling something out of his pouch and opening it. Ino tilted her head to the side to see a better view of it and recognized it as his family's medicine that they made from their deer's antlers. The young buck hesitantly walked up to Shikamaru, the ninja holding out the small container for him to sniff. Ino held her breath as she waited for the deer's reaction, as to which he took a step back. He analized Shikamaru for as second before he took two steps forward and nudged his head into the teen's chest. The blond's mouth fell open in fascination, but is distracted when she felt herself nudged in the back by a deer. She inovolentarily let out a squeal at the contact, whirling around to see six does staring at her with big brown eyes. She was just looking at the four little freckled fawns when she heard a rumble of laughter behind her. Turning around again, she smiled as she saw Shikamaru's face twisted into one of laughter that he was trying to hold in.

"You should have seen your face," were the first words he spoke to her, at to which she scoffed. She was about to make a snappy comeback when the buck nudged Shikamaru again, bringing his attention back to the herbivore.

The two team members watched as he motioned with his head to the direction that they'd come from.

"Apparently they saw something that made them flee up here," Shikamaru voiced again.

"I didn't know you spoke deer," Ino giggled as she gently petted a mother and her big eyed fawn.

"I can't. I can tell by their body language, how they're fidgeting. The only reason I could come so close to them was because I reek of their kind. Yet I still had to use my medicine to show that I was a friend of them. Shows how much they're on edge," he explained in length.

The deer silently trotted over to the river about a hundred feet from them, motioning with his head towards it and stamping his feet near the bank.

"A river? Just like Kiba said!" Ino gasped as she went to Shikamaru's side.

"Right," Shikamaru agreed darkly as he put a few fingers to his lip in thought.

The buck then came back to them and pointed his neck east, using his hoofs to tear up the grassy ground beneath him.

"I think he's telling us now that they're headed East. Probably heading the opposite way as to get away from what scared them."

"So that person, or _Naruto_, (Ino still didn't believe the accusation of him being an Akatsuki member) went North or West?"

"Probably West. Where the Akatsuki are apparently hiding. It all fits." Shikamaru's eyes widened in understanding.

The buck blew out of it's nose before nudging Shikamaru's chest, and then moving on to do it to Ino, at to which she was able to hold in her gasp this time. The animal turned away, but Shikamaru put a hand on it's broad neck, causing it to turn back to him again. He closed his medicine container and put it back into his hip pack, but then pulled out a smaller container. As he opened it, Ino wrinkled her nose at the sticky red stuff inside.

As Shikamaru dipped his index and middle finger into it, he then put his fingers to the buck's ears and rubbed it into his fur.

"What are you doing?" Ino asked in fascination as he started with a doe next.

"Marking them. It's dye that'll hold for a very long time since it sinks into their skin and then dyes their hair when they grow more. It's so that no one will hunt them."

"That's very..._thoughtful_ of you Shikamaru," Ino said with sincerity and a small smile. He turned to her with half opened eyes and shrugged, "Lease I can do for them helping us and supporting the lead."

Ino continued watching him working and started giggling when a fawn tried to eat his green vest.

X - X - X

"I'll bet you couldn't count your balls and get the same answer twice!" Hidan yelled without restraint at Naruto, both of them somehow panting from yelling insults at each other to the highest caliber.

Naruto opened his fanged mouth and took a breath to start, but when the occupants of the room heard a clearing of the throat at the hallway door, he blew it back out and they all turned to the hallway door to see Pein and Konan. Naruto turned his facial expression at the sight of Pein, going from glaringly pissed off to blankness with a hint of respect in his open eyes.

Pein cleared his throat, making everyone straighten a little bit more in the room, before saying "I have decided your punishment Naruto," in a voice devoid of all emotion other then a shred of determination.

"I am ready for your judgement Leader-sama," Naruto bowed shallowly, fast so he could regain eye contact again. He had learned that throughout the years, if you held Pein's gaze for a while it not only made you more brave in his opinion, but also slightly stupid. Naruto was frustrated to be pretending what he used to be, but he swallowed it and allowed to play innocent for future gains. If he could fool Pein then he could get closer to him. Close enough to stab him in the back, literally.

"You, _alone_, will go to Suna and capture the two tailed Jinchūriki there, bringing it back _alive_. You will be given twelve hours to sleep and prepare before you must leave."

Naruto blinked at the punishment, thoughts of _coup d'état_ gone, which sounded more like an opportunity before he regained his bearings and bowed so deep his nose was brushing his legs. Coming up straight again, he said in a steady voice, "I will accept this. I hope I will be able to please you." With that said, he did another shallow bow (this one directed at Konan) before going down the hallway, not forgetting to turn around and flip off Hidan who bristled in return but could do nothing vulgar in the eyesight range of Pein.

"Leader-sama, that is _my_ target," Hidan barely managed to hold himself back from attacking Naruto after his the 'friendly handsign' to obviously him.

"And why are you giving the brat such a cool mission, un?" Deidara added his own opinion, himself glad he and Saosri had already attained their target and so wasn't in the situation like Hidan and Kakuzu.

"It's not because I'm being nice and forgiving, that's for sure," Pein's voice was so empty the others wondered if he was joking or not. But when they saw the curve of his lip, their eyes widened in recognition.

"You're planning something more," Sasori stated the obvious, looking up from his chest that he'd been working on.

Pein nodded once before moving to one of the couches, Konan obediently following to sit by his side. "You see, my third body has just informed me that reinforcements are being sent to Suna to protect the Jinchūrikis."

"Wait...there's more then one in Suna?!" Kisame said with slight shock.

Pein nodded his head again before, "The two and six tails are both there. Apparently the nations believe they will be safe in 'strong' Suna."

"So...even with the help from the Kyuubi, Naruto won't stand a chance against the two hosts _and_ the Konoha reinforcements?" Hidan asked with an more-then-usual evil glint in his rose colored eyes.

Pein stayed silent for a second, closing his eyes to collect his thoughts in the simplest way, before "There's actually no lose in it for me as for one, I want to see how well Naruto has developed and how he will deal with the mountain of power ahead of him. And then two, if he is mortally wounded, it will make collecting the beast inside him easier. In addition, he has become too wild lately and this will show him his place."

"So either way, it's a win-win outcome, un?" Deidara smirked as he played with a clump of clay, his mouth on his right hand chewing on the earth substance as his brain chewed over Naruto's newest predicament.

"But we need to be careful. That is why Sasori, Deidara," both looked up, "I'll be needing you to trail him. Do not give assistance but if he is obviously going to die, make sure to swoop in and take his body. If he does die on the job, you have my full permission to try and collect the other hosts if they are weakened."

Sasori blandly nodded as Deidara's face lit up in a full-blown smirk, the blond slowly turning his head to Hidan who looked even more pissed off then ever.

"We'll have some fun then, won't we Sasori?" he asked his partner who didn't even show the slightest bit of care. The light redhead was just thinking about how he was going to see his puppet in action. Maybe he could remember some of those moves to use later on.

"Why do THEY get to go too? Why not me and Kakuzu?!" Hidan bite the side of his mouth so hard he could feel the sharp taste of blood.

"Because Sasori used to live there, and so is familiar with the terrain and people, and also has many subbordinants there. He is more equiped in you," Pein felt like Hidan was being too much of a pain in the neck lately. The strong split-body shinobi was glad that Hidan nodded, seeming to have been explained into submission.

Pein nodded once again to everyone before leaving with Konan the way Naruto had.

Once Hidan knew the Leader was out of hearing range, he whipped at Deidara and snapped, "I fucking HATE you. You're just getting a free ride because of Sasori!"

"Yeah, yeah. Jealousy isn't a good look for you Hidan. Maybe if you'd prayed a little harder to Jashin you'd have been able to-"

Deidara was cut off as Hidan had lunged forward and had started strangling the explosion-junkie.

Itachi blinked at the two of them, Deidara seeming to obviously need some air soon as his slightly purple face suggested. First looking at Sasori, who seemed to have no intention at all of saving his partner as he pulled a wire, Itachi knew he had to intervene. So, turning to Kisame, he blinked again and the half fish man understood right away.

"Alright, break it up you two," he snapped as he stood to his menacing height.

"Easy for YOU to say!" Hidan growled, his grip on the artist's throat still not loosening.

"You shit, _WE_ were assigned the six-tails and now may not be able to have the opportunity. I'm just as pissed as you are, except I don't take it out on idiot blond over here."

Hidan growled before he released Deidara who huffed before storming out of the large room.

"I just need to fucking kill something or I'm gonna go crazy," Hidan mumbled as he went to satisfy his want.

X - X - X

Shikamaru and Ino walked the short distance back to the group and found that they were all awake and well, a few going through their morning stretches as others got food and fire ready.

Ino allowed her eyes to look over to Hinata who was checking up on Shino, the young Hyuuga having just finished examining Kiba. Ino smiled at the care she gave to her team, but that pride in her best friend was pushed aside as she saw Hinata gasp before staggering away from her teammate before biting her lip to hold in tears.

"What's wrong Hinata?" Ino asked with genuine care as she approached the black haired teen, crouching down to her level.

"It's...I don't think Shino will ever recover. His throat...I didn't heal it in time before and even with yours, it wasn't enough."

"For what?" Ino's eyebrows furrowed.

"He can't talk again, his vocal cords are burned and twisted up," Hinata said while continuing to will herself _not_ to cry.

Everyone stared at Hinata in shocked silence before Kiba turned to his long time friend and asked, "Shino, that true?"

Shino dipped his head in thought before he opened his mouth to try and speak, but found that he really couldn't. He shook his head to say no.

"Fuck everything," Kiba growled into his hands, anger causing his spine to shake like he was about to burst out of his skin, "That FUCKING Naruto is going to get it!"

Hinata, oddly, felt the dull throb of revenge in her gut too as she looked down at her hands, feeling as if she hadn't been good enough once again. Feeling a weight on her shoulders, she looked up to see that Shino had placed his larger hands on her shoulders. He solemly nodded once, causing Hinata to give back a watery smile, the only thing she could manage as she continued biting back tears. She allowed her brain to think over the whole situation and started to feel the bitter taste of the inevitable result of a shinobi-life in her mouth.

"On a more hopeful note, me and Ino discovered something interesting this morning," Shikamaru announced to the slightly down group, making everyone's spirits lift just the slightest. He then went on to explain how Ino and him had found the deer this morning and how it all connected back to what Kiba had explained. The puzzle pieces all fit together and it was now up to them what they determined to do next.

"So once Kiba is healed we'll go into the mountains to search?" inquired Neji after Shikamaru was done.

"I think that is the right choice. Although we've become disadvantaged with Shino's new problem, we don't have time to send back for help. The lead is hot and we need to follow it before it cools and then becomes impossible to follow. Also, the Akatsuki are probably not going to stay in one hide-out for very long. It's only a matter of _short_ time before they decide to move and we need to find them before they do," Shikamaru said while rubbing his bristling chin in thoughts of plans and strategies.

"We can go now, I'm all healed up!" Kiba exclaimed after Shikamaru was done, the dog-boy wanting to get up and start moving ASAP.

"No, you're still injured. Your chakra is slow to circulate through your body from all your injuries and blood-loss," Hinata said softly as she went from Akamaru back to him, putting a few hands on his chest to make double sure. As she heard the steady pounding of his heart, she knew it was getting stronger but it was still not what it used to be. It was still slightly lagged from all the pressure it'd just been under.

Kiba growled in annoyance, feeling ratted out by his teammate. Hinata sighed at his endearing stubborness before moving her delicate hands to his shoulders just like Shino had done for her. He turned his head to her and sighed before, "Fine. Half a day more since you say I need it and I know you know best for me. You're almost _always_ right."

She smiled at him. The first one in what felt like eternity.

X - X - X

Naruto sighed openly as he rolled over in the large bed, sheets splayed out from his half-naked form as he stretched his hands above his head.

"Hope I'm not interrupting anything," a cool voice broke the blond completely out of his sleepy-haze. Sitting upright while rubbing his eyes to get rid of that haze, he blinked his crystal blue eyes to stare up at Konan as she leaned against the frame of his door, hands crossed over her chest.

"Good morning, Konan," Naruto said with an only half-forced grin.

"The sun hasn't come up yet," she said with as much emotion as a corpse.

"It will very soon," Naruto shrugged as he stood up to his full height, stretching his arms over his head again as to stretch his body.

"Will you put some clothes on already?" Konan asked with slight irritation.

"What, don't like my sleeping habits?" Naruto joked as he waved a hand to his only-boxer wearing body.

"I don't like having to stare at something that's only skin and bones," her lips twitched upwards for the slightest of a second, not missed by Naruto's sharp eyes.

"I have muscles, too, Baby," Naruto sniffed as if he was offended, "Maybe not as much as others but they're still there."

She rolled her eyes, saying that this subject of conversation was over, before, "I'm here to inform you that you have a half-an-hour before you must leave."

"Wow, I slept for that long?" Naruto thought out loud, thinking of how he had been allowed 12 hours, as he threw a black t-shirt over his spiky head.

"Have fun on your mission," she offered before she turned to leave.

"You bet!" Naruto laughed as he zipped up his pants.

X - X - X

Kakashi, Sasuke, and Sakura all regulated their breathing as they ran to Suna, using the most sufficient speed that was as fast as they could go without wasting too much chakra. Kakashi raised his nose to the air and sniffed before looking at the sky, deeming that they only had about an hour before the sun set. Plus the air was too crisp, meaning a cold front was coming. Tonight would be especially cold, the degrees so low it might stiffen their bodies up if they weren't extra careful.

So, stopping on a thick branch, he held up his right hand to signal to the two teens behind him and they stopped as well. Sakura just two feet to the right side of Kakashi while Sasuke took a branch just above.

"We will set up base for now. Sakura, go get food. Me and Sasuke will get everything else together."

The pink-haired medic nodded before leaping back into the tangle of trees, thinking about the wildlife she'd spotted on their run and what would be best for nutrition and heath. Kakashi allowed his eyes to follow her lean body before looking up and fixing his one visible eye on Sasuke before ordering, "You go get firewood and start a fire below this tree. Make sure we have enough wood for tonight."

"Won't the smoke attract attention?" Sasuke asked carefully.

"The trees are so thick it'll hold the smoke in, plus we're not close enough to people for it to matter," Kakashi said, knowing he'd throught this through for a reason and annoyed that Sasuke had doubted him, the _Leader_. On missions the Leader was never questioned unless there were large amounts of reasonable doubt. Ordering to get firewood was obviously _not_ that.

Sasuke, as if sensing his past-teacher's anger spike, bowed his head before saying, "Forgive me. It's hard to trust anyone's orders except my own."

Kakashi didn't comment any more (even though he wanted to), knowing he wasn't a temperamental teenager anymore and needed to always keep a level head. And that meant not starting scraps with members of the same team, even if that person had recently (or at lest to Kakashi) betrayed him along with the rest of the village. He didn't have time to think about the raven haired anymore as he saw him dart away in the opposite direction of Sakura.

Landing on the tall grassed forest floor, the silver-haired ninja crouched down and sniffed the ground through his mask, noting that there were a few animals who had passed by, a group of deer notably, but nothing else. He was just about to stand up, but something iron-like and bitter caught his nose from far off. Refusing to gag, he knew the smell was of old blood and, by the scent, it was from a carnivor. He was unsure if it was a human as the scent seemed to be a hybrid of the two, mixed with some canine, but he pushed it away. It was probably just a large wolf or some sort.

Getting to his job, he easily cleared a small area of sticks and piled leaves in three large piles for warmth. When they went into their sleeping bags, they could cover themselves in the dry leaves to further insulate their heat. He then dug a shallow hole into the ground, tearing up the long grass so the fire could have a good place to start. Just as he finished, he heard someone land very lightly in front of him and glanced up to see Sasuke.

"Start it here," Kakashi further ordered the teen who had an armload of all sorts of wood, pointing to the hole he'd just made. Sasuke nodded before he arranged some of the wood into the freshly revealed dirt before doing a few simple handsigns and blowing a strong stream of fire into the timber. Immediatly the fire sparked and it started gnawing on the wood, it's warmth instantly soaring into the air.

Kakashi's eye fell on Sasuke over the fire, his youthful face illuminated in the coming darkness from the fire.

"I know you don't believe me," Sasuke said without looking up from sharpening his kunai, "but you'll see soon enough," he finished and had barely enough restraint to not smirk.

"You're lying," Kakashi said in still-obvious denial.

"What reason do I have to lie?" Sasuke couldn't hold in his smirk any longer before continuing with, "If you think it's to give you further pain, I could just do that _myself_. I have no reason, no gain to lie like this."

A deep rumbling came from the depths of Kakashi's chest before spilling out of his mouth, lips pulled back in a primal snarl just like his pack of loyal dogs did. He was just thinking about screwing the whole 'respect your teammates' when he heard a branch not so far away creak at the weight of someone jumping off of it.

Kakashi had just enough time to bite his tongue and hault his growl before Sakura landed by the fire, an assortment of things clutched in her skilled hands.

"Seems that this forest has lots to offer," Sasuke said as he offered Sakura a glance up from his weaponry.

Sakura numbly nodded as she handed the things over to Kakashi who started preparing them. Sakura, as she sat a in the third pile of dry leaves, wondered if it was just her or if the air was crackling with more then just heat from the fire.

X - X - X

The wind whipped in Naruto's eyes and tore through his ears and clothes, yet he didn't realize it in the slightest. For he had just remembered something very important that had slipped his mind before he'd been able to have time to think, like he was having while running. He knew that he had cut-off Kyuubi away with that seal, but that seal only lasted 7 days. With his unconsciousness from Sasuke's poison he realized he didn't known how long he was out for. It could have been one day, it could have been three. Because of this, his count of the days was off and he had no idea how much time he had left until Kyuubi could come back into his head and being again.

He knew he'd come out full force too since he was probably beyond pissed and Naruto also knew he'd have to find some place where he could focus on the inner-battle inside him and not allow the Kyuubi to take over his entire being.

A growl ripped from his mouth and into the cool air of night, knowing that even with this realization he had no time to dwell on it as he landed on the top of a sheer cliff and looked down into the one of the great five nations. Feeling the sand in the crisply dry air that he breathed in, his nose crinkled in distaste. This place was not only in the middle of the dessert that was as desolate an old bone, but it was just as large as Konoha. But, as his eyes scouged the village, they had another similarity in how their Kage tower stretched higher into the cloudless sky then the rest of the odd buildings.

So, with a confident smirk on his face, Naruto leapt off the cliff and into the village covered by shadows.

* * *

Glossary/Notes

0400 - Military time for 4:00 AM

I know it might be boring from the other prospectives and side stories of the others, but no need to fear. That reading is all build-up that will pay off in time. Plus I find that it keeps the story interesting and with different views it helps shape and develop the story more. And anyway, in the original series there's always many things going on at once and that's one of the things I really love about Naruto. Connections with the different plots are always innovative and fun to make too.


End file.
